Jeff Sessions slams ‘state of lawlessness’ in Chicago

“Your success is even more remarkable since violent crime is surging in most places across the country,” Sessions said in prepared remarks for a speech at the Port of Miami in South Florida. He praised the county for cutting down on violent crime through “hard work, professional policing and a rededication to the rule of law,” as well as proving to the Department of Justice it is now in “full compliance” with federal immigration law.

Sessions said that’s why he is threatening the roughly $2.3 million in justice assistance grants — known as JAG grants — Chicago used last year to buy SWAT equipment, police vehicles, radios, and stun guns.

Chicago is setting “one sad example” of how “respect for the rule of law has broken down,” Sessions said. City leaders force police to “release the criminal alien back into the community without regard to the seriousness of the crime or how long the rap sheet,” he added.

“These predators thrive when crime is not met with consequences. This state of lawlessness allows gangs to smuggle guns, drugs, and even humans across borders and around cities and communities. Sanctuary jurisdictions provide safe harbor for some of the most dangerous criminals in our country,” Sessions explained.

Sessions noted Miami-Dade had no shootings over July 4th weekend — but Chicago had more than 100. However, Sessions did not present specific research data linking sanctuary policies with that crime-filled weekend, or the high rate of crime in Chicago where there were more than 4,300 shooting victims in 2016.

The attorney general made it clear that he was not criticizing local police, and instead blamed sanctuary jurisdictions that “tie our police officers’ hands and endanger federal immigration officers as well when they are forced to pursue these criminal aliens outside of the jails and prisons.”

“[W]e cannot continue giving federal taxpayer money to cities that actively undermine the safety and efficacy of federal law enforcement and actively frustrate efforts to reduce crime in their cities,” Sessions lamented. “So if voters in Chicago are concerned about losing federal grant money: Call your mayor.”

Last week, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel was joined by other city officials in filing a lawsuit against the Justice Department for its plan to withhold the grants.

“Rather than acknowledge soaring murder counts or the heartbreaking stories told by victims’ families, Chicago’s mayor has chosen to sue the federal government. He complains that our focus on enforcing the law would require a ‘reordering of law enforcement practice in [the city],'” Sessions said — but he was quick to add, “That’s exactly the point.”

“For the sake of their city, Chicago’s leaders need to recommit to policies that punish criminals instead of protecting them,” Sessions said, offering one more plea to not just Chicago, but other jurisdictions to follow Miami-Dade’s lead.

In response to Sessions, Emanuel said Chicago will “continue to stand up proudly as a welcoming city, and we will not cave to the Trump administration’s pressure because they are wrong morally, wrong factually, and wrong legally.”

“In a week in which the Trumpa administration is being forced to answer questions about neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and the KKK, they could have not picked a worse time to resume their attack on the immigrants who see America as a beacon of hope,” Emanuel said in a statement Wednesday.

Acting Assistant Attorney General Alan Hanson said in a letter earlier last week to Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez. Gimenez then sent a memo to the Miami Board of County Commissioners, revealing Miami-Dade will receive a $500,000 grant for fiscal year 2017.

Last month, Sessions told jurisdctions they must prove compliance with federal immigration law in three ways to recieve the grants next fiscal year as part of his broad crackdown on sanctuary policies. San Francisco and other cities have joined Chicago in suing the Justice Department for the new guidelines.

“It means more money for crime fighting. And it means we are partners in keeping everyone here safe,” Sessions said Wednesday.

Sessions praise of Gimenez and Miami-Dade comes even as the mayor — a newly elected Republican in a historically liberal area of South Florida — slammed President Trump for his “ambiguity” toward the white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va.

The explicitly critical statement of Trump was issued just hours before Sessions’ speech of praise.

Miami-Dade became the first, and so far only, major jurisdiction to reverse its sanctuary city policies in response to threats from both Trump and Sessions regarding Justice Department grants at the very beginning of the administration. Trump called the decision “Strong!” in a late-January tweet.

Critics said Gimenez’s sanctuary dial-back could have been because of his son, Carlos Gimenez Jr., a former consultant for Trump in the Miami-Dade area.

In April, the 40-year-old Miami-area attorney joined the new lobbying firm run by the president’s former campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski to “represent those who would further the interests of the Trump Administration and the American people.”

According to The Miami Herald, since Gimenez directed country jails on Jan. 26 to beginning honoring all Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainer request, authorities have sent county 463 “detainers.”

Of those, 143 detainees were turned over to immigration authorities.

Amien Kacou, staff attorney for the ACLU of Florida, accused the Trump administration of “overreach.”

“Instead of standing with its residents against the Trump administration’s overreach and unacceptable immigration platform, Miami-Dade caved to the administration’s bullying tactics. The anti-immigrant policy adopted by Miami-Dade County violates the Constitution,” Kacou said in a statement.

“By enforcing this anti-immigrant policy, Attorney General Sessions and Mayor Gimenez will endanger public safety, all in an effort to expand the administration’s mass deportation force. We encourage all cities and counties to stand strong and adopt freedom cities’ policies to protect the rights of all.”

Tom Cochran, who leads the U.S. Conference of Mayors, slammed Sessions’ speech saying the organization will be submitting an amicus brief in support of Chicago’s lawsuit.

“It’s clear from his statement today that Attorney General Jeff Sessions doesn’t understand what it means to run a city that welcomes immigrants. He doesn’t understand the Constitutional protections afforded to all people in our country and their impact on local policies. He doesn’t understand the nature or the causes of crime and violence in our cities,” Cochran said.

Cochran said his bipartisan organization will be inviting mayors nationwide to support Chicago in court.

“The U.S. Conference of Mayors stands with Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and deplores the attacks which the Attorney General leveled against him today and on previous days. An assault on one mayor is an assault on all mayors,” he said in a statement.