gracchusdixit

Amidst all the stumbling and fumbling of Donald Trump’s first 100  days in the White House, one part of his administration has been moving forward with ruthless speed and pitiless efficiency—the Department of Justice. The new leader of that department, former Alabama Senator Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III, made it clear from the moment he was sworn into office that what he refers to as “law and order,” rather than “justice,” was going to be his top priority.  Sessions has been remarkably forthright about his agenda, which is to transform the Department of Justice into the instrument of what amounts to a police state.  Instead of protecting ordinary Americans from the overreach of government or the oppressions of powerful private interests, Sessions aims to vastly expand the power of precisely those interests and to control or cow those who oppose them.

In a speech delivered at the border between the United States and Mexico, Sessions heralded what he called “a new era, the Trump era,” in which he promised to strangle the flow of undocumented immigrants and to clamp down on what he wants us to believe is a crime wave of historic proportions.  In the official text of his speech, which was leaked to the press before he actually delivered it, Sessions described undocumented immigrants as “filth.”  When it actually came time to deliver the speech, however, he flinched, dropping the word “filth,” no doubt because he realized at the last moment how incendiary such an epithet would be.

Despite this last-minute act of self-censorship, there is no way to sugarcoat the dismal reality of what Jeff Sessions thinks, believes, intends to do, and is already doing.  He is a man who flagrantly lied about his Russian connections during his confirmation hearings and thereby committed perjury by any normal understanding of the term.  He got away with it, because the Senate of the United States was too cowardly to embarrass one of its own.  Having got away with his lie, he is now emboldened.

Sessions is an unapologetic white racist, whose prejudices are so sweeping and deep-seated that he either fails to recognize or refuses to acknowledge them.  When a Supreme Court dominated by conservatives voted to gut one of the most fundamental provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, he hailed that decision as “good news for the South,” as if the Civil War had never taken place, as if slavery had never existed, as if Jim Crow had never suppressed the rights or threatened and taken the lives of countless black Americans.

Sessions insists that our country is facing a crime wave that simply doesn’t exist, unless by “crime” he means those who exercise their constitutional right to demonstrate against Donald J. Trump and the countless local police departments across the land who routinely victimize anyone who isn’t lily white.

He declares that Hispanic immigrants are agents of “depravity,” whereas most of them are simply trying to escape from the true danger and depravity that beset the countries from which they are fleeing.  Remarkably few undocumented immigrants commit any crimes once they are here.  Indeed, their malefactions pale in comparison with the criminal behavior of native-born white Americans. The truth of the matter is that undocumented immigrants are the most exposed, vulnerable, and fearful people in the country.  The last thing most of them want is an encounter with the cops.

Sessions claims that local police officers have been “demoralized” by Justice Department consent decrees designed to ensure that their practices abide by the Constitution and the law, as if the “morale” of police officers somehow supersedes their obligations to treat all citizens—and immigrants—with respect and due process.  He attributes countless examples of systematic and egregious police racism to “a few bad apples.”  Try telling that to the citizens of Ferguson, Missouri, or Chicago, Illinois.

He asserts that marijuana is a “gateway drug,” leading to the hellish pit of heroin or cocaine addiction.  There is no evidence whatsoever to support this claim, nor is there any evidence that mass incarceration for minor drug offenses does anything to prevent or reduce serious criminal activity.

Finally, Sessions proclaims that the federal government has no business interfering with local and state law enforcement, invoking the doctrine of “states’ rights.”  This is the oldest trick in the long, lamentable history of white racism in our country and is the clearest signal of Jeff Sessions’ true intentions and utter hypocrisy.  He invokes “states’ rights” only when it suits his purpose and rails against that principle when it stands in his way.   On the one hand, he would deny the federal government any role in reining in the misbehavior of local or state police departments that are blatantly racist or corrupt.  On the other hand, he wants to strip funding from local or state police departments that do not toe the line when it comes to deporting immigrants.  All the while Jeff Sessions proclaims the sanctity of “states’ rights,” he deplores the notion of “sanctuary” states or cities.  He wants to have it both ways—as long as that means his way.

It is abundantly clear that, to Jeff Sessions and his godfather, Donald J. Trump, “justice” is nothing more than a political term of art, a synonym for prejudice backed by intimidation and force.   Sessions believes in justice only for the Americans he approves of and for no one else.  If you are brown or black, gay or lesbian, if you choose to smoke a joint rather than guzzle a six-pack, if you dare to ask a question when you’re pulled over by a swaggering cop, if you even for a second raise a finger to help an undocumented immigrant, it’s time to lock your door, draw the curtains, and hide in the basement.  The storm troopers are on their way.  Listen for the sound of their boots.