Trump’s DOJ prosecutes key Virginia Democrat, generating difficult questions

Federal prosecutors have brought criminal charges against Virginia Senate President Pro Tempore L. Louise Lucas, a leading Democrat in the state who drove its redistricting push. According to the Associated Press, the Justice Department accuses her of directing an operation that obtained and sold large amounts of marijuana and laundered the money. Seven people are named in the indictment, Lucas and several relatives among them, and she turned herself in. The case follows an FBI search of her office and a cannabis shop she had invested in about five months earlier, according to MS NOW.

Lucas responded by recalling her upbringing under Jim Crow and saying she will keep fighting those who try to silence critics.

MS NOW commentator Steve Benen says he cannot judge the evidence, and allows that the investigators may have acted properly. Still, he argues that Justice Department and FBI leaders have lost the presumption of good faith, pointing to what he calls a pattern of retaliation against Democrats, with the election under two weeks away. He also notes that Fox News apparently learned of the May search beforehand and aired it live.

Summarized by PolitiKool from MS NOW’s reporting. Read the full story at MS NOW →