Politics
GOP lawmaker shocked after anti-ICE sheriff was stumped by ‘fifth-grade civics’ question
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North Carolina Republican state Rep. Allen Chesser said he was taken by surprise when a Democratic sheriff who has long opposed cooperating with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) could not answer a basic question about how the government works.
A North Carolina House Oversight Committee hearing spurred on by the recent killing of a young Ukrainian woman, Iryna Zarutska, in Charlotte, took an unexpected turn when Chesser asked Mecklenburg County Sheriff Garry McFadden, “What branch of government do you operate under?”
McFadden, who is the top law enforcement officer in the county where Zarutska was killed, simply answered, “Mecklenburg County,” prompting Chesser to repeat, “What branch of government do you operate under, sheriff?”
The sheriff answered, “The Constitution of the United States,” to which Chesser responded, “That is what establishes the branches of government; I’m asking what branch you fall under.”
After McFadden answered, “Mecklenburg County” again, Chesser remarked, “This is not where I was anticipating getting stuck. Um, are you aware of how many branches of government there are?” The sheriff quickly shot back, “No.”
CHARLOTTE LIGHT-RAIL STABBING MURDER SPURS LANDMARK CRIMINAL JUSTICE REFORM FROM NORTH CAROLINA REPUBLICANS
Left: The skyline of the City of Charlotte, North Carolina, which sits in Mecklenburg County. Right: Sheriff Garry McFadden. (Andrea Evangelo-Giamou / EyeEm via Getty Images; The Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office/Facebook)
After a long pause, Chesser continued, “For the sake of debate, let’s say there are three branches of government: legislative, executive, judicial. Of those three, which do you fall under?”
The sheriff answered, “I believe I fall under the last one … judicial.”
“You are incorrect, sir. You fall under the executive,” said Chesser.
After this, Chesser continued to press McFadden about how he reconciles his responsibility as an officer under the executive branch to enforce the law with his opposition to cooperation with ICE. Chesser asked McFadden how he reconciled his responsibility with a previous statement in which the sheriff said, “We do not have a role in enforcement whatsoever, we do not have to follow the rules and the laws that are governed by our lawmakers in Raleigh.”
The sheriff said that Chesser was taking his quote out of context, saying it was strictly in reference to immigration enforcement.
Though declining to offer more context on the statement, McFadden affirmed his office is now abiding by state law requiring cooperation with ICE, saying, “We follow the law, when the law is produced, we follow the law.”
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Iryna Zarutska curls up in fear as a man looms over her during a disturbing attack on a Charlotte, N.C. light rail train. (NewsNation via Charlotte Area Transit System)
In an interview with Fox News Digital the day after the hearing, Chesser, who is an Army veteran and former police officer, said that, “Obviously, those weren’t the cache of questions that I was thinking we were going to get him on.”
“I had several statements that he had made to the media and to the local press and in different interviews that kind of conflicted with some of the testimony that he provided yesterday about following the law. We made it to [only] one of those statements because we got held up on what I thought was baseline, just kind of setting a baseline of how we were to establish that his role is to enforce the law,” he explained, adding, “I was not expecting to have to get into a fifth-grade civics lesson with a duly elected sheriff.”
He said that McFadden has “decided to make himself kind of a centerpiece in the refusal to enforce immigration law here in North Carolina, adding, “It’s not so much the refusal to enforce immigration law, but it’s the refusal to enforce state law that says he must cooperate with ICE and ICE detainers when people are in custody in his facilities.”
WHO IS IRYNA ZARUTSKA, UKRAINIAN REFUGEE KILLED IN CHARLOTTE TRAIN ATTACK?
Ukrainian Iryna Zarutska came to the U.S. to escape war but was stabbed to death in Charlotte. (Evgeniya Rush/GoFundMe)
“Last summer, we had the unfortunate death of a young Ukrainian national that had sought refuge in our country and in our state,” Chesser went on. “I think that all North Carolinians, and all people who find themselves in North Carolina, should be able to count on one thing when it comes to public safety, and that is whether or not you are safe and whether or not the law will be enforced is not dependent on what county you find yourself in.”
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“North Carolina is a safe state for all the people who choose to come here, and that is the point of the Oversight Committee [hearing] that we were having was, making sure that the law is equally applied and fairly applied across all imaginary lines in our state,” he said.
The Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
new video loaded: Reflecting Pool Turns Green, Paint Peels After Renovation
transcript
transcript
Reflecting Pool Turns Green, Paint Peels After Renovation
Algae blooms have hit the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, which underwent a $14.2 million repair project. Blue paint appeared to be chipping from the bottom.
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“The reflecting pool is greener than I have ever seen it before due to algae.” “I was expecting to see blue, but green is O.K.” “Honestly, I don’t think you can fight mother nature.”
By Julie Yoon, Jackeline Luna and Alisa Shodiyev Kaff
June 19, 2026
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House GOP Conference Chairwoman Lisa McClain, R-Mich., rebuked a school board in Richmond, Michigan, after some of its members tried to remove a conservative colleague for missing meetings while on military deployment to the Middle East.
Ray Stier, who received an American flag and a copy of the Congressional Record from McClain on Thursday as a commendation of his work, had been on deployment, attending board meetings remotely, but eventually lost virtual access.
That’s when the board called for his removal, citing a “disservice” caused by his absence.
“One of the board members’ family was taking to social media and putting out misinformation about myself and my wife and things that were not factually accurate and then ultimately calling for my resignation and prompting others to reach out to the district to call for my recall,” Stier recounted.
PARENTS SAY THEY’RE RUNNING FOR LOCAL SCHOOL BOARDS TO FIGHT ‘POISONOUS’ CRITICAL RACE THEORY
House GOP Conference Chairwoman Lisa McClain, R-Mich., left, pictured alongside Ray Stier, a school board member in Richmond, Michigan. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images; office of Lisa McClain)
The moment is just the most recent clash between Republicans and school boards over policies that, in their view, are gatekeeping schools against diversity of thought and accountability.
“I think education is extremely important and vital,” McClain told Fox News Digital.
“And educators and administrators need to teach children how to think, not what to think. It’s about time that administrators begin to get held accountable for their actions. Good actions and bad actions.”
McClain’s meeting with Stier comes on the heels of a congressional hearing last week where she grilled a superintendent from Virginia over student privacy policy, probing if those policies were being unevenly applied to favor transgender students.
VIRGINIA SCHOOL DISTRICT SLAPPED WITH COMPLAINT ALLEGING NEW CLAIMS IN VIRAL TRANS LOCKER ROOM FIGHT
Rep. Lisa McClain, R-Mich., leaves a House Republican Conference meeting at the Capitol Hill Club on Feb. 28, 2023. (Tom Williams/ CQ Roll Call via Getty Images)
“The victims got a 10-day suspension and the biological female that did the filming got a one-day suspension,” McClain said, referring to an incident at Stone Bridge High School in Loudoun County where students had been reprimanded for filming in a locker room.
“How does that make sense?”
In Stier’s case, McClain questioned whether the board had targeted Stier on account of just his deployment overseas. Stierhad clashed with the board after learning that some of the district’s bathroom policies would have allowed fourth-grade students to use the same bathroom as transgender eighth-grade boys.
“Prior to him filling the seat, the seat was open for two months,” McClain observed. So that logical argument doesn’t exactly make sense to me; it doesn’t really hold a lot of water.”
MICHIGAN PARENT WANTS TRUMP TO ACT AFTER DAUGHTER SHARES LOCKER ROOM WITH TRANS-ATHLETE
House GOP Conference Chairwoman Lisa McClain, R-Mich., left, pictured alongside Richmond, Michigan school board member Ray Stier right. (Office of Lisa McClain)
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For his own part, Stier believes his case will refocus attention on the importance of the school board and its membership.
“My goal is to continue being an advocate for the community. One of the good things that I think came out of this was that it got so much attention that some of the community members who were unaware of the dynamics that were not being brought to light,” Stier said.
California’s political watchdog commission on Thursday finalized a $31,500 fine against Gov. Gavin Newsom, alleging that the Democratic leader failed to report three dozen behested payments totaling $5.5 million mostly to support wildfire recovery by the deadline under state law.
The Political Reform Act requires elected officials to disclose payments of $5,000 or more that they solicit or direct others to give to a charitable, legislative or governmental purpose within 30 days.
The California Fair Political Practices Commission said 34 of the violations were for failing to report on time that Newsom and his staff directed outreach from companies and foundations that wanted to help after the Los Angeles wildfires to the California Fire Foundation. The nonprofit was started in 1987 by the California Professional Firefighters to support the families of fallen firefighters and communities impacted by fire.
The donations include $1 million from the Chuck Lorre Foundation and $500,000 apiece from Lockheed Martin, the Anthem Blue Cross Foundation and BlackRock, among others gifts.
The governor also failed in 2024 to report on time two behested payments, totaling $100,000 from the Schmidt Family Foundation and Schwab Charitable Funds to the Institute for Local Government, a nonprofit within the League of California Cities.
The commission said the governor reported all of the payments “prior to public discovery” or contact from its enforcement division, which it considered a mitigating factor. Newsom also signed the stipulation and agreed to the fine.
Tara Gallegos, a spokesperson for Newsom’s office, said the issue involved late paperwork at a time when the governor’s staff was focused on emergency response and supporting survivors. She also underscored the fact that the reports were filed before he was contact by the FPPC.
Gallegos said the fine is unrelated to an alleged investigation into the governor and his wife by the Department of Justice, which Newsom announced this week.
Newsom alleged Monday that Trump is using the government as a political weapon to target him and his wife, Jennifer Siebel Newsom. Newsom announced the investigation after he learned that the FBI and Internal Revenue Service asked his associates questions about nonprofits and businesses related to the couple.
The governor’s office characterized the investigation as a fishing expedition. The Trump administration declined to comment.
A source familiar with the matter, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it publicly, said two federal probes have been going on for about a year, and that they originated not from Washington, D.C., but from conversations between whistleblowers and federal prosecutors based in Sacramento. The probes are linked to Newsom’s former chief-of-staff, Dana Williamson, and Siebel Newsom’s taxes, the source said.
The FPPC violations mark the second time Newsom has reported payments late, which increased his penalty for the new infractions. The commission fined Newsom in 2024 for failing to timely report 18 payments totaling $14.4 million.
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