DOJ dropping the hammer on Fairfax Virginia | Hour 2

What's going on. Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to three on WBT Radio in Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all of the links, become a patron, go to thepeteclendershow dot com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button. Get every episode for free right to your smartphone or tablet, And again, thank you so much for your support. So up in Virginia, I haven't covered the individual cases because you know, we're Charlotte, so uh, you know, we may own most of the name of Charlottesville, but you know, people aren't really that interested in sort of the the individual case loads and dispositions of cases against criminals up there, unless it's like a national story that kind of a thing. So but I have been I've been watching various reports out of Fairfax County and they've got a prosecutor up there, or as they call them, the Commonwealth's Attorney, Steve Descano is his name, And this guy is a woke leftist right and I have seen stories come across the news wires about various people that have committed pretty horrendous things and keep getting let out or having their charges dropped or reduced. And now it appears it has caught the attention of the United States Justice Department. So yesterday afternoon I get a press release from the DOJ. The Justice Department notified the Fairfax County, Virginia Commonwealth's Attorney, Steve Descano, of the initiation of a federal investigation into the plea bargaining, charging decisions and sentencing policy. Okay, so they're looking at that policy. It covers, as the name might indicate, plea bargains what you decide to charge somebody with, and then the sentencing that you're requesting. The Justice Department's Civil Rights Division will investigate whether the office of the Fairfax Commonwealth's Attorney discriminated against US citizens by offering preferential treatment only to illegal alien criminal defendants. So you've got the discrimination going against citizens and helping illegal aliens. Assistant Attorney General Harmey Dillon, she is over the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, said in the press release quote. This investigation will uncover whether this prosecutor is putting the community at risk in offering sweetheart deals to illegal immigrants charged with serious crimes. The Department has conducted similar investigations where violations have been found, and the resulting settlement agreements have led to important reforms. More on that in a minute. But then there's a copy of the letter that was sent to Steve Descano, the prosecutor in Fairfax County, And in the second paragraph here it says regarding the plea bargaining, charging decisions and sentencing policy. It states that policy states, in relevant part quote, Assistant Commonwealth's Attorneys shall consider. So this is not a may consider. This is shall you have to do this? If you are a prosecutor in that office, you have to consider immigration consequences where possible. Okay, so think about that somebody comes in, they've been arrested and charged with some offense, and you are now deciding on what to charge them with, whether to pursue those charges, or to reduce the charges, whether to give them a plea bargain. And then if you actually convict them of something, if you haven't like tossed the charges or you know, downgraded them to such a low level that they don't serve any time, you know, they just basically walk out, maybe paying court costs or something. But if you do get a conviction, then what is the sentence and how does the policy guide those decisions? When the policy says you have to consider immigration consequences, and then it says prosecutors shall consider the collateral immigration consequences of the specific crimes the defendant is charged with. So, in other words, if I, as a citizen arrested for the same crime that you, an illegal alien, get arrested for, that you are going to get a lower level charge, you are going to get a better plea agreement, and you are going to get a lighter sentence because the prosecution shall consider the collateral immigration consequences. Well what does that mean. Well, that means deportation. Right, So if you and I both get arrested, I'm a citizen and you're an illegal alien, I may get held. I may get charged with a more serious thing and can't make bond, get a higher bond, whatever, maybe no bond, but you you get a lower bond, maybe no bond at all, because that would be a collateral immigration related consequence. Because if you're being held in the jail, then ICE may be alerted to the fact that you're in the jail, and they then may show up outside the jail and pick you up. So in order to avoid that consequence, they're not going to charge you with the same thing that they charged me with, even though we did the exact same thing, and that would be discrimination against me because you're getting preferential treatment based on your immigration status based on these guidelines. That's not equal protection under the law. And when you undermine equal protection under the law, you are tearing away at the very fabric of this society. Because if people think that the law does not apply to everybody the same way, right, then they're going to start trying to if they can get into power, they'll start trying to apply the law against another group of people in order to exact revenge. Now from Lawyer Monthly, the investigation extends beyond local Virginia politics because it places prosecutorial discretion, immigration related charging practices, and federal civil rights enforcement authority under direct legal scrutiny. That issue is whether prosecutorial policies or decision making practices may have produced unequal treatment between similarly situated defendants, potentially engaging federal anti anti discrimination statutes tied to publicly funded criminal justice institutions. This is a piece written by Susan Stein. She goes on to say, the investigation appears focused on whether immigration status may have influenced plea negotiations, charging discretion, sentencing recommendations, or diversion decisions within the office. Well, of course it did, of course it did. Those are the guidelines. There's no way they can't. There's like if it had said that you know, assistant DA's could consider or may consider, right, then that would still leave prosecutorial discretion to a larger degree than when you mandate that they take into account immigration status. And the only reason you would do that is as Discano has proven time and again with these various stories that keep coming out of Fairfax, Virginia of illegal aliens that get released back into the community on no bail, low bail, whatever, and they are a menace and then they commit a more serious offense and that then makes the national news, like the mother who was murdered at the bus stop a couple of months ago. So of course these uh, there's been this impact. Of course there has been you know, influence over play deals, charges and sentencing. Of course there have fin because it's right there in the guidelines. It's their policy. They have to do it. I think Descano's gonna be in some trouble. This is good news, people, good news. See let's ward off those black pills. You know. Stories are powerful. They help us make sense of things, to understand experiences. Stories connect us to the people of our past while transcending generations. They help us process the meaning of life, and our stories are told through images and videos. Preserve your stories with Creative Video started in nineteen ninety seven and Minhill, North Carolina. It was the first company to provide this valuable service, converting images, photos and videos into high quality produced slide shows, videos and albums. The trusted, talented and dedicated team at Creative Video will go over all of the details with you to create a perfect project. Satisfaction guaranteed. Drop them off in person or mail them. They'll be ready in a week or two. Memorial videos for your loved ones, videos for rehearsal, dinners, weddings, graduations, Christmas, family vacations, birthdays, or just your family stories all told through images. That's what your photos and videos are. They are your life told through the eyes of everyone around you and all who came before you, and they will tell others to come who you are, Visit Creative video dot Com. Let's see here, Eddie says, tell us how sanctuary cities are legal. I don't. Yeah, I don't know if I can. I can make an argument either way on that. Actually I can see, Like I understand the Democrats are argument on it. I don't agree with it, but I think they're exploiting a loophole, basically vagueness, because like when the law was originally written in the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration Enforcement, when all of these things were built and Congress, you know, implemented the law, I don't think anybody ever considered that you would have local jurisdictions trying to nullify the law, you know. I just I think it never crossed their minds. But that's what Democrats have been doing because the law says that, you know, the federal agents are tasked with this enforcement. Because the states at the time were like, well, we don't want to be. You know, or I. Should say, immigration is a federal thing, and so the states are not charged with having to patrol our own borders. And I'm sure the states didn't want to take on those costs and all of that, but nobody thought that you would have Democrats that would move so far to the left. I mean the immigration law was done by Democrats in Congress. Okay, so like this idea that you would nullify federal law and refuse to cooperate and then actually obstruct the enforcement of federal immigration law. I don't think that ever crossed their minds. And so now what Congress needs to do is to go back in there and make it a requirement at a national level that you shall cooperate, that local law enforcement shall cooperate, not may cooperate, but shall cooperate with federal immigration law. Particularly the detainers. You shall hold them until Ice can come get them in your jails. Now, you have states that have done this very thing at the state level. North Carolina just did it. We had to override the governor's veto. It cost Carla Cunningham her seat in the General Assembly because she was a Democrat who voted with the Republicans to force sheriffs like Mecklenberg Sheriff Gary not my fault, McFadden, to cooperate fully with Ice and stop playing these games in releasing illegal aliens that get arrested for crimes. They go into the jail. I mean that was the two eighty seven G program. If I'm in Congress and we could pass to the law on Congress, I would make two eighty seven G a requirement for all of the local jurisdictions. When somebody is brought into the jail, you shall you must run their information through the ICE databases. Every jail, every processing center has to be tied into the ICE system. So when somebody comes in, you get their biometrics, their fingerprints, you know, if they've got any you know, documents or whatever. But I'm told none of them have any documents whatsoever. That's the only thing that they're guilty of is being undocumented, but whatever. Like, you run their fingerprints through the system, right, you get their photographs, you run photo matches and stuff. You identify the person. Once identified, ICE is alerted, then you have to hold that person so ICE can come get them and ship them out of the country. That's it, Like to me, it's very simple, Like that's the way you close this loophole. But because it's not a requirement, Democrat cities and states are saying we're just not going to cooperate. And in Fairfax County, what it sure looks like, is that you actually get more dispensation if you are an illegal alien. If they're going to hold me on a charge, they're not gonna hold you as an illegal alien because if they hold you, Ice may find out and deport you. So this DA or the DA's office up there has been giving preferential treatment to illegal aliens over citizens, and it kind of seems pretty obvious to me that that is discriminatory towards citizens, all of them. Any US citizen that would otherwise be facing stiffer penalties, stiffer plea deals or less yeah yeah, or I mean less beneficial plea deals right there. Obviously discrimination based solely on some buddy's immigration status citizenship status. Allen says, California migration is not a fit for a Beach Boys tune. Slow the California got. I don't know what happened there, calif I'm having a hard time understanding your text here, Allen's why I'm kind of stumbling. Caliph Please, please, people, please check your texts for spelling and grammar, because I'm trying to read these things and it's very difficult. One seventy nine, Hm, I don't know what this is from Dana. Dana is not a fan of the show, but listens all the time. Hate listeners listen most It's been that way for a long time. Pete, don't believe me, because I know you do your research. But if a black man sold crack cocaine or was the possession of it, was in possession of it, white man sold pure cocaine, he would receive less time than the black man. Again, don't take my word for these facts. Yes, I am aware of the difference in sentencing for coke versus crack, but there was actually a reason for that. But I know everybody've used everything through oppress or repressed and white man versus black man's drug of choice, and all of that same thing goes from marijuana, right while they banned marijuana while legalizing alcohol. Yeah, However, if you are going to discriminate, it seems to me like you would discriminate in favor of the citizens. You know. One quick point on the difference in the sentencing for cocaine versus crack that Dana was highlighting as proof that this happens all the time, Like that discrimination happens all the time. There is a difference between crack and coke I'm not sure you're aware of that, but there is a difference. And when crack cocaine first came onto the scene, right, there was a belief that it is highly addictive, that it was destroying people's lives and communities and stuff in a way that cocaine was not. And I think a lot of people want to retcon that into it was purely a race thing. So I'm not denying that there was a racial component to the crack epidemic. I'm definitely on board with that, but like, I mean, not on board, but like I understand, like there is the racialized component to the crack epidemic, of course, But to say that it was that the sentencing guidelines were strictly done because of racism is infantile. There, it is. It's an oppressor, repressed Marxist. View to say to see that, like that's the only reason why there was different sentencing. There's different sentencing for all sorts of different drugs, right, the same amount of coke versus the same amount of fentanyl. If you have a pound of each, I think one of them is going to give you way more harsh of a sentence, and it's probably the fentanyl but I don't know the sentence in guidelines, and I've always said the marijuana guidelines were too strict. It never should be listed as a Schedule one narcotic because it's not like I've talked about this issue. For the entire time I've been on the air. I've done stories on that. Anyway, the federal government now appears to be testing whether prosecutorial discretion itself can become actionable if exercised in a manner viewed as discriminatory towards particular groups of citizens. See, it's different if the law says this drug gives you this amount of sentence, or this crime gives you this amount of sentence, But then you have prosecutors saying, well, in my discretion, this person is not a citizen, so I'm going to give them a lighter sentence. Or in Dana's example, if the sentence in guideline says a black man and a white man both get charged with possession of the same amount of cocaine, then for some reason and the white guy gets a lighter sentence than the black guy, that would be and if that's part of your guidelines to take into account their race. But yeah, that's discriminatory. You can't do that. Also up in Virginia, Fairfax, Virginia, Louise Lucas. She is the Senator President pro tem Senate President pro tem, the leader of the Virginia State Senate, and she had her office and nearly a dozen other locations raided by the FBI. It's a corruption probe. Search warrants were issued. This is from MSN. Federal agents are conducting a raid at the office of Luis Lucas, a Democrat who serves as the Virginia Senate President pro temporee. The FBI is serving multiple search warrants at the office in Portsmouth, Virginia, approved by a federal judge. Agents are also searching a cannabis dispensary located next door to her office. The Washington Examiner reports about Lucas's alleged ethical irregularities began to emerge last fall. Virginia's or Luis Lucas, a woman helping lead the charge to redraw the Commonwealth's congressional maps to favor Democrats ahead of the twenty twenty six midterm elections, has used her donor's cash to bankroll her family business fund her daughter's political career, cut checks to churches who support her party, pay for casino events, support organizations where she is a member, and to cover tabs at restaurants dealing in steak and seafood. I've never heard phrase like that, but the Virginia lawmaker is no stranger to campaign finance controversy. Has her approval for a casino project after receiving one hundred thousand dollars donation from the company proposing it drew scrutiny from the press back in twenty twenty four. One of the churches to receive the most cash from Lucas's campaign treasury is New Mount Olivet Baptist Church in Portsmouth, where Lucas herself serves serves as a deaconess. So huh, So her campaign is donating money to the church where she's an elder. Kay seems sus As the kids would say. People are saying this is part isan retaliation because she did the redistricting maps and then was celebrating it. In all this, she has T shirts that she was selling in or to protect my efforts. Why does that keep happening? I don't understand why that keeps happening. She had T shirts that were printed up that said ten bleep in one starts with an F. The bleep starts with an F ten bleep in one, which is the new map ten Democrats seats one report we can see, right, And so she's like spike in the football and everyone's saying, oh, that's the you know, that's just proof or this these raids are proof that this is you know, the weaponized DOJ and all of that. A slight problem though. Washington Post reported the investigation began during the Biden administration. That okay, but that's just. The Washington Post, right, Do we have any other confirmation besides the WAPO here? Yes, actually, yes we do. It's the New York Times, and they confirm that the probes started under Biden and it involves alleged corruption around cannabis licensing, hence the raid on the cannabis shop right next door to her office. So while her t shirts may have said ten bleep in one, she may have to start worrying about one to bleep in ten. Here, that's just one thought, and that's not my thought. Actually, I stole that from Ed Morrissey at hot air dot com. Now, this woman, Louise Lucas has had some other, shall we say, questionable behavior when it comes to ethics. I shall provide some details in a moment. So about this Senate leader in Virginia, Louise Lucas. Interesting story in when I was doing some of the research on this topic yesterday, because she got her office and these I think it's like a dozen locations got raided by the FBI as part of a corruption probe. And I was not aware of who this woman was. I don't follow Virginia state politics, so I did not know who she was. But there's a lot of press on her. For example, Luke Rosiak at Daily Wire back in November last year, in the weeks before the election, Virginia Democrats told voters that they condemned political violence and that Jay Jones, who was running for Attorney General in Virginia, that Jay Jones was remorseful about his desire to shoot a Republican and the Republican's children. Yeah, oh that too, Like he wanted to shoot the Republican Senate leader in the head two bullets, and then he wanted to shoot the children and have the children die in their mother's arms. And the reason why this would be justified was to finally get those dastardly Republicans to come around on gun grabbing legislation. You see, So if you don't agree with us, then I am justified with murdering you see, see. How that works. But we are not condoning violence here, people. I don't know why this is so difficult to understand. Right, just because I think murdering some kids and you would convince you to agree with my policies does not mean that I believe violence is necessary to achieve policy victories. Okay, let's keep that clear. But then hours after the Democrats had won, right, they picked up a whole bunch of House seats and Senate seats. They won the governor's mansion, they won the statewide like Lieutenant governor ag they won all the races, they got the trifecta. They are in complete control. And hours after their victory, well, Louise Lucas appeared to suggest that she wasn't angry with Jay Jones for making the comments so much as she was angry that Virginians found out thanks to a snitch. Yeah she was, Yeah, she said, Virginia is for lovers, not snitches. Okay, so he's got these fantasies of murdering his political opponents. But we shouldn't talk about that. Nobody should know. Virginia voters shouldn't know that their attorney general thinks like this. And then she had posted this online along with an artificial intelligence generated video showing Jay Jones kicking his opponent Jason Millares, who was depicted as a dog so much wrongly. So they're not for violence. We are just promoting violent imagery. It's different. The snitch comment appeared to reference Carrie Coyner, who was a Republican delegate, which is their like representative. They call them delegates up there, and she was the one that Jay Jones when he was a delegate, sent his murderous texts to, and who confirmed their authenticity to the National Review for a story that upended the election. Coiner, the most moderate member of either chamber, was subject to a vicious campaign accusing her of betrayal by Don Scott, a Democrat who replaced Todd Gilbert, the man that Jones wanted to shoot in the head. Don Scott, a convicted crack dealer, is the Speaker of the House. Okay, Don Scott totally corrupt up there. While Lucas, And that's that's what I've heard from Nick Fretus, Like he is awful. Lucas. Louise Lucas operates a marijuana shop a dispensary, which probably is why her shop got raided. The snitch meme was also reposted by Senator Lashrik shashy. Aired. I think us how they pronounced that all are members of the state's black caucus as Jones. The snitches meme echoes the phrase snitches get stitches. It's used by criminals to describe their practice of assaulting. People who speak to police. Jay Jones did win. He won with fifty three percent of the vote, which was just about two and a half percent behind the Democrat candidate for lieutenant governor, which suggests that there might be very little penalty among Democrat voters after all. Like, that's what I mean, They're going to vote for a guy who's fantasizing about violence. I think Mo Davis should do another run for Congress, right, Mo Davis out in the western part of North Carolina, who fantasized about crushing Republicans necks with the bottom of your heel and grinding them down into the pavement until you can hear the snap of their necks, right, that's what he fetishized and fantasized about, like this violence porn fetish. Ucas also this woman whose places were rated also reposted a comment calling her ruthless and said she intends to redistrict the state out going Attorney General MIAs, who was beaten. By Jay Jones. He had issued illegal opinion saying that the constitutional amendment process would be illegal if the Democrats were to pursue this, and then Lucas responded, quote, your opinions are poop. They're bleeping poop. That's the Senate President pro tem. That's the Virginia way. All right. That'll do it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I could not do the show without your support and the support of the businesses that advertise on the podcast, so if you'd like, please support them too and tell them you heard it here. You can also become a patron at my Patreon page or go to dpetecallanershow dot com. Again, thank you so much for listening, and don't break anything while I'm gone.