Connect with us

West

Harris' shift from tough-on-crime prosecutor to social justice advocate faces scrutiny from conservative group

Published

on

Harris' shift from tough-on-crime prosecutor to social justice advocate faces scrutiny from conservative group

Vice President Kamala Harris’ checkered prosecution record during her tenure as California attorney general is resurfacing as her bid for the White House heats up. From locking up parents whose children had chronically missed school to supporting a bail fund that let violent Black Lives Matter rioters out of jail in 2020, Harris’ approach to criminal justice is facing fresh scrutiny.

America First Legal (AFL), a nonprofit conservative legal watchdog group, launched seven investigations into Harris’ prosecutorial background on Thursday afternoon, alleging that Harris “has proven to be the most radically progressive Vice President in American history.”

“A lot of her tough on crime reputation goes to her prosecution when she was San Francisco DA, individuals who use marijuana and other sorts of things,” Dan Epstein, president of AFL, told Fox News Digital. “Our investigation, however, makes it very clear that Kamala Harris does not believe much in terms of statutes passed by legislatures, including the Federal United States, Congress, as well as the state of California.”

IT’S A MARGIN OF ERROR RACE BETWEEN TRUMP AND HARRIS 

Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at her presidential campaign headquarters in Wilmington, Delaware, on Monday. (Erin Schaff/Pool via Reuters)

Advertisement

Through public records requests to the California Attorney General’s Office, AFL is investigating Harris for failure to comply with federal donor privacy laws; failure to enforce federal immigration laws; failure to pursue equal justice; failure to disclose conflicts of interest; failure to address evidence of misconduct; the nature of probes by the California Fair Practices Commission; and potential cover-up of misconduct evidence.

“And so those are really our probes of her not following the rule of law and bending it for a political objective,” Epstein said. “We also probe numerous kind of potential ethics issues and failures to disclose conflicts of interest, allowing her own staff as attorney general to engage in fraud and not kind of overseeing that.”

Early in her legal career, Harris dated California Assembly Speaker Willie Brown, who reportedly helped her secure influential positions at the California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board and the California Medical Assistance Commission. AFL is now investigating whether Harris received undue political favoritism and whether she properly recused herself or disclosed conflicts of interest.

HARRIS BREAKS FUNDRAISING RECORDS SINCE BIDEN DROPPED OUT OF 2024 RACE

Vice President Kamala Harris delivers remarks with President Biden in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washinogton, D.C., on July 26, 2021. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

Advertisement

During her 2020 presidential campaign, which she launched in January 2019, Harris faced significant criticism over her prosecutorial record. Opponents of tough-on-crime prosecutions argue it disproportionately affects low-income families and minorities, further entrenching them in the prison system.

One of the most criticized aspects of Harris’ record was her handling of school truancy cases. Harris supported a truancy law, passed in 2011, that allowed district attorneys to charge parents with a misdemeanor if their children were chronically absent during the school year without a valid reason.

In 2019, Molly Redden of HuffPost reported how the truancy program affected some families in her article, “The Human Costs of Kamala Harris’ War on Truancy.” Among those impacted was Cheree Peoples, an African American mother arrested in April 2013 after her child had missed 20 days of school.

ABORTION, ‘FREE’ EDUCATION AMONG TOP ISSUES FOR HARRIS VOTERS

Vice President Kamala Harris speaks to supporters during a campaign rally at West Allis Central High School in West Allis, Wisconsin, on Tuesday. (Jim Vondruska/Getty Images)

Advertisement

Harris later walked back her crackdown on truancies in a 2019 podcast, saying it “never was the intention” to criminalize parents and describing the California law as one with “unintended consequences,” Politico reported at the time.

She also faced accusations of being too harsh on low-level drug offenders during her time as San Francisco’s district attorney and later as the state’s attorney general. Liberal critics argued that her policies contributed to mass incarceration of Black men rather than focusing on rehabilitation and criminal justice reform.

But in June 2020, Harris promoted the bail fund that helped bail Black Lives Matter rioters out of jail, but only a fraction of the more than $41 million actually went to freeing rioters.

As of Monday night, the website was running and accepting donations.

Advertisement

Meanwhile, some Democrats are framing a potential Harris-Trump matchup as the “Prosecutor vs. the Felon,” in light of former President Trump’s recent court cases.

“It’s fairly clear that nobody disagrees, nobody disagrees that Trump is a felon because of political prosecution,” Epstein said. “And if the standard for Kamala Harris is that the process that led to Donald Trump being convicted is one of justice and one that she follows, then logically, it means that she is a political prosecutor, not a fair honest broker.”

Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.

Fox News Digital’s Stepheny Price contributed to this report.

Advertisement

Read the full article from Here

Continue Reading
Click to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

San Francisco, CA

Supervisors urge California to expand S.F. speed-camera program

Published

on

Supervisors urge California to expand S.F. speed-camera program


San Francisco supervisors authorized a resolution Tuesday urging California lawmakers to expand the city’s automated speed camera program, which currently has 33 cameras operating in the city under a state pilot.

The board’s 10-to-1 vote on Tuesday, with District 10 Supervisor Shamann Walton voting against it, will not add cameras immediately, but formally asks the state to explore changes to the program. The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency has identified at least 80 additional high-need locations that could benefit from automated enforcement, according to a report filed with the Public Safety and Neighborhood Services Committee.

Richard Zieman, whose son Andrew, a paraeducator, was killed in November 2021 by a speeding driver outside Sherman Elementary School on Franklin Street, told Mission Local that city officials should do more. “They waited for a tragedy,” Zieman said. Parents and school leaders had repeatedly asked the city to slow traffic on Franklin Street, where drivers barreled downhill toward the Marina, said Zieman.

Supervisor Matt Dorsey, who introduced the resolution, has said the city’s first year of automated speed enforcement shows that the technology works. The SFMTA reported nearly an 80 percent reduction in drivers traveling at least 10 miles per hour over the speed limit at camera locations after the program launched in March 2025. San Francisco was the first city to implement the pilot authorized under Assembly Bill 645.

Advertisement

The pilot, however, is capped by state law at 33 camera locations. Tuesday’s resolution asks California lawmakers to consider allowing more, prioritizing corridors on San Francisco’s High Injury Network, including Franklin Street.

Walk San Francisco, a pedestrian advocacy group which spent roughly eight years advocating for the state legislation that created the pilot, called the resolution an important first step toward broader expansion.

“Thirty-three cameras is nowhere near the number of cameras we need for people to realize that San Francisco is a safe-speed city,” said executive director Jodie Medeiros. “This tool is working. People are lowering their speeds.”

District 6, represented by Dorsey, currently has seven of the city’s 33 cameras, most of them in SoMa. The district also records the highest number of crashes involving injuries or fatalities in San Francisco, making it a focal point in the debate over expanding automated enforcement.

The resolution advanced unanimously from the Board of Supervisors’ Public Safety and Neighborhood Services Committee last week, where Dorsey said the cameras have made streets “feel safer” and argued the early results show “why we should have even more of this life-saving technology.”

Advertisement

Zieman, whose son’s death prompted traffic-calming improvements and eventually a speed camera near Sherman Elementary, said the issue is urgent. 

“There are probably other Franklin streets out there,” he said. “I just hope they don’t wait for someone else before they expand the program. It’s too late for Andrew.”





Source link

Advertisement
Continue Reading

Denver, CO

Five Points affordable housing building honors Dr. Justina Ford | Rocky Mountain PBS

Published

on

Five Points affordable housing building honors Dr. Justina Ford | Rocky Mountain PBS


DENVER — Dr. Justina Ford’s name adorns plaques and statues across Denver, where she delivered more than 7,000 babies as the city’s first licensed Black woman physician. Now, an affordable housing building in Five Points, the neighborhood where she lived and worked for 50 years, bears her name.

The newly christened Justina at Five Points, formerly Brunetti Lofts, offers a rare commodity in Denver’s housing market: family-sized affordable housing units.The 23-unit building, built in 2005, has 19 three-bedroom units. Rents range from $840 to $1,893 per month. Residents must make between 30% and 60% of Denver’s area median income, and specific income requirements vary depending on the unit.

“I do believe that in the last, five, ten years, maybe a little longer, housing here in Colorado has just gone crazy. I mean, I have a little two-bedroom townhouse, and I can’t afford to move back in the neighborhood I grew up in because of the pricing. And it’s just crazy,” said Daphne Rice-Allen, chair of the board at the Black American West Museum and Heritage Center, which is housed in Ford’s historic home in Five Points.

Rice-Allen grew up in Clayton, which is northeast of Five Points. This cluster of neighborhoods in north Denver — Five Points, Cole, Whittier and Clayton — were among the areas deemed “hazardous” and “definitely declining” on the city’s 1938 “Residential Security Map,” which redlined neighborhoods with Black, Mexican and lower-income residents.

Advertisement

At that time, Five Points flourished as a cultural and entertainment hub, known as “the Harlem of the West” and serving as “the seat of Denver’s African American community.” Black social clubs, such as the Owl Club, emerged. And Ford, who arrived in Denver in 1902 and was not allowed to work in a hospital, continued to provide medical care out of her house and deliver babies at her patients’ homes. 

“This was a family neighborhood, Rice-Allen said about Five Points during that period.

“There were a lot of families that lived in the area and lived in the neighborhood.”

But Five Points’ demographics have changed a lot since Ford died in 1952. About 30% of households in the neighborhood were families in 2020. By 2024, that percentage dropped to about 20%. 

The neighborhood experienced a drastic shift in racial demographics as well. In 2000, about 27% of the residents were white, 26% Black and 43% Hispanic. The 2020 census told a different story: 64% white, 10% Black and 17% Hispanic.

Advertisement

What was once a Black cultural hub is now a majority-white neighborhood, which raises concerns about gentrification and displacement of long-time residents. Despite the large supply of affordable housing units in the area — 2,796 in 2024 — about half of renters in Five Points are cost-burdened, meaning they spent more than 30% of their income on housing.



Source link

Continue Reading

Seattle, WA

Seattle weather: Hot and sunny day Wednesday, highs in the 80s

Published

on

Seattle weather: Hot and sunny day Wednesday, highs in the 80s


Wednesday will be another warm day with highs in the mid to upper 80s for parts of western Washington. Eastern and central Washington will reach near 100F with high fire danger. The coast and north interior will be cooler, only in the 60s to 70s.

Today's Highs

Wednesday will be another warm day with highs in the mid to upper 80s for parts of western Washington. 

Advertisement

Fire Weather Watch

A Fire Weather Watch goes into effect Wednesday evening through Thursday evening for thunderstorms and gusty winds. Lightning strikes could create new fire starts and, with very dry conditions in place, any new fire could spread quickly.

Fire Danger

A Fire Weather Watch goes into effect Wednesday evening through Thursday evening for thunderstorms and gusty winds. 

Advertisement

What’s next:

An upper level low will move into the Pacific Northwest, bringing scattered showers and a chance of thunderstorms. The heaviest showers will be in the morning hours and will turn more scattered into the evening hours.

Thursday Showers

An upper level low will move into the Pacific Northwest, bringing scattered showers and chance of thunderstorms. 

Advertisement

Looking Ahead:

High pressure will build again Friday and into the weekend, increasing temperatures and sunshine. We will start to see highs reach the upper 80s to low 90s by early next week.

Advertisement
Seattle Extended

High pressure will build again Friday and into the weekend, increasing temperatures and sunshine. 

MORE NEWS FROM FOX 13 SEATTLE

6-year-old Bellingham, WA boy dies from injuries after beach driftwood accident

Advertisement

Grandmother thwarts Pike Place kidnapping, Seattle police make arrest

‘Transfer Fire’ near Lake Chelan, WA hospital prompts evacuation notices

Here’s where WA wildfires are currently burning

Advertisement

Seattle office vacancy crisis shifts tax burden onto homeowners

Thurston County, WA couple desperate to find dog after Rover sitter vanishes

Advertisement

Husband of pregnant wife killed in Seattle sues King County homeless authority

To get the best local news, weather and sports in Seattle for free, sign up for the daily FOX Seattle Newsletter.

Download the free FOX LOCAL app for mobile in the Apple App Store or Google Play Store for live Seattle news, top stories, weather updates and more local and national news.

Advertisement

The Source: Information in this story came from the FOX 13 Seattle Weather Team and the National Weather Service.

WeatherWeather Forecast



Source link

Advertisement
Continue Reading
Advertisement

Trending