Paul Ryan breaks with Trump to condemn pardon of Joe Arpaio
To paraphrase Captain Renault in “Casablanca”: Shocked! I am shocked, I tell you…to find out that Paul Ryan would break with President Trump over the pardon of Sheriff Joe Arpaio.
As close as and as loyal to Mr. Trump that Ryan has been, it is a shock of gigantic proportions.
But there is good reason, as the angelic Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan says:
“Law-enforcement officials have a special responsibility to respect the rights of everyone in the United States. We should not allow anyone to believe that responsibility is diminished by this pardon.”
To think that President Trump should pardon such a notorious lawbreaker…a former sheriff who defied a JUDGE…imagine, a JUDGE, by enforcing federal immigration law!
No wonder the Speaker weeps!
Mr. Ryan, however, perhaps after he dries his tears, can give us a little insight into his views on a former Attorney General, cited for blatant contempt of Congress for serious and repeated obstruction, lying, and refusal to fulfill his responsibilities to uphold the US Constitution; that would be a former Attorney General whose subordinates flatly refused to seek prosecution for his defiance and whose superior, a former president of the United States, who would also refuse even to seek to determine the facts of the matter.
Ah well…that was another time, a more settled period, with a great president in the Oval Office, and all was well with the establishment.
DLH
Reading from the bloggoshere we find these retorts to liberal criticisms of the matter from comments at National Politics:
John Stevens (excerpt)
The unlimited power of pardon is granted to the president by the constitution. Therefore, there is no violation of the separation of powers.
JMilor (excerpts)
The court order Joe violated, was itself a violation of Federal statutes. That’s the abuse of power, and Trump used his legal authority to correct this injustice – perfectly legit. . . .
Checks and balances apply to all branches. The activist judges have been getting away with overstepping their bounds for decades – and they are the furthest removed from the voting public. The only two checks against their activism, is power of pardon, and impeachment. . . . As for Obama’s pardons, he did them against mountains of objections from miliary staff, many of whom suffered many casualties at their hands. . . .
What if the judge decided acts of slavery should be ignored, and Joe refused to accept that? With that in mind – realize that much of human trafficking is made possible by ignoring border security. Cyotes aren’t exactly the most reputable folks to do business with – as many Hispanics, among others, will concede. Ironically, Obama was the biggest supporter of the sex slave industry in the world, by propagandizing the public to equate border security with racism, which is absolutely ludicras. No other country in the world is so lax on their border security as the US, because it’s an open invitation to criminals.
Teagen2015 (excerpt)
. . . the overwhelming majority of illegals entering Arizona are Hispanics how do you not profile? Joe Arapio was a threat to Obama’s open borders policy and like everyone who opposed the regime, he was removed one way or another . . .
