Cashless bail law becomes lighting rod in Illinois before November’s election

As Illinois looks to become the first state in the country to abolish cash bail, battle lines have been drawn from both sides of the issue before the November election.

The measure is part of the SAFE-T Act, an acronym for "Safety, Accountability, Fairness and Equity-Today." The law would allow pre-trial detainees to be released from jail for numerous crimes,including second-degree murder and kidnapping.

The bill passed with the support of Chicago Democrats. Proponents of the law say it is wrong to keep people locked up simply because they can't afford bail. WTF

"The status quo is what makes communities unsafe," said Sen. Robert Peters, D-Chicago, during a recent news conference. "The violence we see today is due to a system that ties freedom to money, that allows some people–especially those who are a threat to others–to pay bond and be released from jail." (These people are truly insane)

Attorney Thomas DeVore, who is a Republican running for Illinois attorney general, said at a news conference Wednesday that Democratic legislators overstepped their legal bounds with the SAFE-T Act.

"The court that we have is set up to administer justice. They get to decide how that justice is administered. Bail is one of the primary components of which they have inherent authority and constitutional authority. The legislature cannot impede that or get in the middle of that," said DeVore.

The Chicago Tribune reports Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul acknowledged this week at a campaign event that he has concerns about the SAFE-T Act and spoke of the need to hold discussions to clarify some of the provisions, including the one that eliminates cash bail. "We are often clarifying ambiguity or uncertainty in countless laws," said Raoul. "Is the SAFE-T Act worthy of that discussion? It is."

DeVore said Raoul should have put a halt to the legislation that passed in January 2021 immediately. "The attorney general should have acknowledged that this law was passed without a lot of debate becauseit was snuck through the legislature in the wee hours of the morning," said DeVore.

Two Illinois state's attorneys have filed a lawsuit against Gov. J.B. Pritzker and others, alleging that the SAFE-T Act, including the end of cash bail, violates the Illinois constitution. Will County State's Attorney James Glasgow and Kankakee County State's Attorney Jim Rowe filed the lawsuits in their respective counties. The suits say the legislation violates the state constitution in several ways, including "the right to have the safety of the victim and the victim's family considered in denying or fixing the amount of bail."

"It is my sworn duty as Will County's State's Attorney to protect the people of Will County and the State of Illinois. To put it in plain and simple terms, this is not about politics; it is about public safety," Glasgow said in a statement.

https://justthenews.com/nation/states/center-square/safe-t-act-becomes-lighting-rod-controversy-novembers-election

Federal Court Rejects Trump’s Special Master Review, Instead Trusting FBI Completely

BY: MARGOT CLEVELAND

SEPTEMBER 22, 2022

1 OF 2

Rather than continue to fight this losing and expensive battle, Trump should pivot to the midterms and take his case to the public.

The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals dashedformer President Donald Trump’s hopes that his attorneys could review the 100 documents marked classified that the FBI seized during a raid of his Mar-a-Lago home. Wednesday’s decision by the federal appellate court came just one day after the special master indicated no such review would take place absent evidence that Trump had declassified those documents.

While Trump could still seek intervention by the Supreme Court, given the special master’s unwillingness to give Trump’s legal team access to the documents that the FBI maintains have classification markings, Trump should drop his case and pivot to the midterms — and let the public decide whether Democrats have weaponized the Department of Justice to target the former president.

Wednesday’s decision by the 11th Circuit turned the tables on Trump, who less than one week ago appeared to have scored two huge victories in his fight to have an independent special master review the documents and items seized by the FBI during an August 8, 2022 raid of his home. The first win appeared to come when Judge Aileen Cannon appointed Trump’s preferred candidate to serve as special master, Raymond Dearie.

The second victory came from Judge Cannon’s rejection of the DOJ’s request to put on hold her earlier ruling that, pending a special master’s review of the material, the government could not use the documents seized as part of its criminal investigation. The DOJ had limited its request for a stay to only those 100-some documents that the government claimed bore classification markings.

On Friday, the DOJ filed a motion to stay with the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, asking the appellate court to stay Judge Cannon’s order, but again, only to the extent that her order barred the government from using the 100-some documents that purportedly bore classification markings for criminal investigative purposes.The DOJ also objected to providing those documents to Special Master Dearie for his review. The 11th Circuit expedited consideration of the DOJ’s motion to stay, directing Trump to respond to the motion by Tuesday at noon.

Tuesday proved significant for another reason, with Dearie, a former FISA court judge and current senior federal judge in New York, holding his first public hearing with the parties. During that hearing, the special master indicated that unless Trump presented evidence to the court that he had declassified the 100-some documents, there was no basis for Trump’s attorneys to review that material. (If no one can see the documents how would they know what was classified?) Dearie also suggested Trump’s attorneys would not be receiving security clearance in the near term, which would also limit their ability to review the documents of concern.

The former president’s attorneys counteredthat “until they see the documents, Trump’s legal team was not in a position to fully disclose their defense or specifically address the declassification issue.” While acknowledging “that there was a legal strategy at play,” Judge Dearie stressed that, “if the government gives me prima facia evidence that these are classified documents, and you, for whatever reason, decide not to advance any claim of declassification, I’m left with a prima facia case of classified documents, and as far as I’m concerned, that’s the end of it.”

Following Tuesday’s hearing, Trump and his attorneys had some tough decisions to make concerning whether to present evidence of declassification to Special Master Dearie. But the 11th Circuit’s order on Wednesday removed the decision from Trump’s hands when the three-judge panel granted the DOJ’s requested stay.

https://thefederalist.com/2022/09/22/federal-court-rejects-trumps-special-master-review-instead-trusting-fbi-completely/

>>17561121

2 of 2

Obama Judge Robin Rosenbaum and Trump appointees Britt Grant and Andrew Brasher issued the unsigned 29-page opinion for the court that concluded the government would likely succeed on its claim that Judge Cannon erred in prohibiting the United States from using the “classified records in its criminal investigation and to require the United States to submit the marked classified documents to a special master for review.” Here, the courtfound dispositive the fact that there was no evidence that the DOJ had displayed a callous disregard for Trump’s constitutional rights. (Rights for other Presidents but not for not for Trump)

The 11th Circuit nonetheless added that Trump failed to show he had “an individual interest in or need for any of the one-hundred documents with classification markings.” Further, even if the documents had been declassified, Trump still hadn’t shown why he had a personal interest in the documents, the court reasoned.

In entering the stay, the federal appellate court also stressed the harm to the government the order created, relying on Alan E. Kohler Jr.’s, the assistant director of the counterintelligence division of the FBI, sworn statement that the United States’ “national-security review is inextricably intertwined with its criminal investigation.” “When matters of national security are involved, we ‘must accord substantial weight to an agency’s affidavit,’” the 11th Circuit stressed.

The 11th Circuit further found that the “public interest” favored a stay because “the documents at issue contain information ‘the unauthorized disclosure of which reasonably could be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security.’” Here, the court again relied on FBI Assistant Director Kohler’s declaration to support this finding.

In discussing the “public interest,” the 11th Circuit completely ignored the public’s interest in assuring an unbiased review of the documents — the concern that motivated Judge Cannon’s decision. Wednesday’s opinion instead accepted at face value everything the DOJ and FBI said: that the documents were marked classified and FBI Assistant Director Kohler’s various representations about the harm to national security and the need to advance the criminal investigation in tandem with the national security one.

Yes, that’s how courts work: The judges accept sworn statements as true and rely on the government’s word, absent conflicting evidence. But it remains hard to swallow that the courts place continued trust in a DOJ that previously submitted four fraudulent applications to the FISA courts to get Trump.

In response to Wednesday’s decision, Trump could seek the Supreme Court’s intervention, but even if Trump were to prevail with the high court, Special Master Dearie seems unwilling to allow the former president’s attorneys anywhere near the 100-some documents marked classified, unless Trump proves he declassified them. And even then, Dearie may adopt the 11th Circuit’s view that Trump has no interest in reviewing those documents. So even a win might not accomplish Trump’s goals.

Thus the 11th Circuit’s decision struck a severe blow to Trump and those seeking transparency. But rather than continue to fight this losing and expensive battle, Trump should pivot to the midterms and take his case to the public: Make the voters the judge of the Biden administration’s conduct and the Democrats’ relentless targeting of Trump and anyone who ever supported him.

The timing for this pivot couldn’t be better, with the New York attorney general filing a civil lawsuit against Trump and three of his children on Wednesday, with news breaking that the Jan. 6 Committee plans to question Ginni Thomas, and with a class-action lawsuit filed against Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis over his role in transporting illegal immigrants to Martha’s Vineyard. The recent demand by Republican senators that Attorney General Merrick Garland provide special counsel protection for the U.S. attorney investigating Hunter Biden further adds to the message of the Democrats’ weaponization of justice, by highlighting the double standard in play.

We should know soon whether Trump will continue to fight this losing battle or focus on the broader war against Democrats this November, as the special master gave Trump only until Friday to pick a vendor to handle the scanning of the 11,000 other documents not affected by the stay.

https://thefederalist.com/2022/09/22/federal-court-rejects-trumps-special-master-review-instead-trusting-fbi-completely/

Seems like “they” got to Dearie or had prior dirt on him. Remember John here to help said many, many judges were compromised by the DOJ and FBI nasty tricks squad, at that time Rod Rosenstein was in charge of the squad.

>>17561130

The actions of Dearie should reveal to Trump supporters that theres no justice in the Just Us Department, andshould convince millions more to get out the vote on the midterms and put every Trump republican running in a office.

Congress has to get their fucking act together and dismantle the corruption at DOJ and FBI. Congress believed them and ignored the corruption for too many years. Stop the monthly or quarterly payments of their budget when republicans take the house and senate on Jan. 1, 2023. Kash said Nunes and him threatened this to FBI because they wouldn’t turn over documents and it worked like a charm, they got the docs the next day.

But even then, Nunes and Kash never heard of some of the people in the Russia Hoax brought out by Durham. The FBI is too powerful and totally corrupt.

>>17561211

At this point some insider in the government should just release all the docs to the people, we’ll never get them from the government and the courts are just as corrupt and biased. There’s no such thing as a non partisan judge, look at the SC

FBI hero paying the price for exposing unjust ‘persecution’ of conservative Americans

Miranda Devine

1 of 4Holy shit anons you’ve got to read all four parts of this!

Bombshell allegations by FBI Special Agent Steve Friend contained in a whistleblower complaint filed late Wednesday with the Department of Justice inspector general reveal a politicized Washington, DC, FBI field office cooking the books to exaggerate the threat of domestic terrorism, and ­using an “overzealous” January 6 ­investigation to harass conservative Americans and violate their constitutional rights.

Friend, 37, a respected 12-year veteran of the FBI and a SWAT team member,was suspended Monday, stripped of his gun and badge, and escorted out of the FBI field office in Daytona Beach, Fla., after complaining to his supervisors about the violations.

He was declared absent without leave last month for refusing to participate in SWAT raids that he believed violated FBI policy and were a use of excessive force against Jan. 6 ­subjects accused of misdemeanor ­offenses.

This American hero, the father of two small children, has blown up his “dream career” because he could not live with his conscience if he continued to be part of what he sees as the unjust persecution of conservative Americans.

“I have an oath to uphold the Constitution,” he told supervisors when he asserted his conscientious objection to joining an Aug. 24 raid on a J6 subject in the Jacksonville, Fla., area. “I have a moral objection and want to be considered a conscientious objector.”

Friend, who did not vote for Donald Trump in the 2020 election, said he told his immediate boss twice that he believed the raid, and the investigative process leading up to it, violated FBI policy and the subject’s right under the Sixth Amendment to a fair trial and Eighth Amendment right against cruel and unusual punishment.

Multiple violations

In his whistleblower complaint to DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz, obtained by The Post, Friend lays out multiple violations of FBI policy involving J6 investigations in which he was involved.

He says he was removed from active investigations into child sexual exploitation and human trafficking to work on J6 cases sent from DC. He was told “domestic terrorism was a higher priority” than child pornography. As a result, he believes his child exploitation investigations were harmed.

He also has reported his concerns about a politicized FBI to Republican members of Congress, among 20 whistleblowers from the bureau who have come forward with similar complaints.

Among Friend’s allegations:

The Washington, DC, field office is “manipulating” FBI case management protocol and farming out J6 cases to field offices across the country to create the false impression that right-wing domestic violence is a widespread national problem that goes far beyond the “black swan” event of Jan. 6, 2021.

As a result, he was listed as lead agent in cases he had not investigated and which his supervisor had not signed off on, in violation of FBI policy.

https://nypost.com/2022/09/21/fbi-hero-paying-the-price-for-exposing-unjust-persecution-of-conservative-americans/

>>17561338

2 of 4

FBI domestic terrorism cases are being opened on innocent American citizens who were nowhere near the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, based on anonymous tips to an FBI hotline or from Facebook spying on their messages. These tips are turned into investigative tools called “guardians,” after the FBI software that collates them.

TheFBI has post-facto designated a grassy area outside the Capitol as a restricted zone, when it was not restricted on Jan. 6, 2021, in order to widen the net of prosecutions.

 The FBI intends to prosecute everyone even peripherally associated with J6 and another wave of J6 subjects are about to be referred to the FBI’s Daytona Beach resident agency “for investigation and arrest.”

The Jacksonville area was “inundated” with “guardian” notifications and FBI agents were dispatched toconduct surveillance and knock on people’s doors, including people who had not been in Washington, DC, on Jan. 6, 2021, or who had been to the Trump rally that day but did not go ­inside the Capitol.

Friend says he was punished after complaining to his bosses about being dragged into J6 investigations that were “violating citizens’ Sixth Amendment rights due to overzealous charging by the DOJ and biased jury pools in Washington, DC.”

His top-secret security clearance was suspended last week because he “entered FBI space [his office] and downloaded documents from FBI computer systems [an employee handbook and guidelines for employee disciplinary procedures] to an unauthorized removable flash drive.”

In a Sept. 16 letter from the head of FBI human resources, he was told he waslosing his security clearancealso because he “espoused beliefs which demonstrate questionable judgment [and demonstrated] an unwillingness to comply with rules and regulations.”

Reprisals from bosses

In his whistleblower complaint, Friend describes “reprisals” from his supervisors after he voiced his conscientious objections.

He says they ignored his complaint about “manipulative casefile practice [which] creates false and misleading crime statistics, constituting false official federal statements.

“Instead of hundreds of investigations stemming from an isolated incident at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, FBI and DOJ officials point to significant increases in domestic violent extremism and terrorism around the United States.

“At no point was I advised or counseled on where to take my disclosure beyond the reprising officials above;the threatened reprisal constituted a de facto gag on my whistleblowing.”

https://nypost.com/2022/09/21/fbi-hero-paying-the-price-for-exposing-unjust-persecution-of-conservative-americans/

>>17561343

3 of 4

On Aug. 19, he first told his immediate boss, Supervisory Senior Resident Agent Greg Federico, that he believed “it was inappropriate to use an FBI SWAT team to arrest a subject for misdemeanor offenses and opined that the subject would likely face extended detainment and biased jury pools in Washington, DC.

“I suggested alternatives such as the issuance of a court summons or utilizing surveillance groups to determine an optimal, safe time for a local sheriff deputy to contact the subjects and advise them about the existence of the arrest warrant.”

Federico told him it would have been better to just “call in sick” rather than voice his objection and “threatened reprisal indirectly by asking how long I saw myself continuing to work for the FBI.”

Four days later, Friend was summoned to Jacksonville to meet his next-level bosses, Assistant Special Agents in Charge Coult Markovsky and Sean Ryan, about his refusal to join the SWAT raid.

He told them about his concerns over “irregular” case handling of J6 matters that he believed were in violation of a legal rule known as “Brady” that requires prosecutors to disclose evidence that would exonerate a defendant.

They asked if he believed any J6 rioters committed crimes and he replied: “Some of the people who entered the Capitol committed crimes, but others were innocent. I elaborated that I believed some innocent individuals had been unjustly prosecuted, convicted and sentenced.”

Markovsky then asked Friend if J6 rioters who “killed police officers” should be prosecuted, even though no such thing happened. When Friend pointed out that “there were no police officers killed on January 6, 2021,” Markovsky told him he was being a “bad teammate.”

Both agents “threatened reprisal again by warning that my refusal [to go on the SWAT raid] could amount to insubordination. References were made to my ­future career prospects with the FBI.”

Friend was labeled AWOL the day the raid took place and stripped of his pay.

A week later, he was told to meet the top agent in Jacksonville, Special Agent in Charge Sherri Onks, who told him he needed to do some “soul searching” and decide if he wanted to work for the FBI.

https://nypost.com/2022/09/21/fbi-hero-paying-the-price-for-exposing-unjust-persecution-of-conservative-americans/

>>17561348

4 of 4

When he told her “many of my colleagues expressed similar concerns to me but had not vocalized their objections to FBI executive management,” she told him his “views represented an extremely small minority of the FBI workforce.”

She then shared the emotional experience of fearing for her own life on Jan. 6, 2021, when she was sitting on the seventh floor of the secure J. Edgar Hoover Building, FBI headquarters, after protesters one mile away “seized the Capitol and threatened the United States’ democracy.”

Agents used as ‘pawns’

Friend says his concerns are shared by large numbers of rank-and-file FBI agents across the country who believe they are being used as pawns to pursue the political agenda of the bosses in Washington, DC.

These kinds of abuses of the law are a “morale killer” for field agents, he says.

Many agents, who joined the FBI in the wake of 9/11, are keeping their heads down because they are close to their 20-year retirement with full pension. But he says they are equally disgusted at being forced to take part in the politicization of federal law ­enforcement.

Other whistleblowers say that disquiet grew after the FBI raid on Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home in Florida on Aug. 8.

Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, who is working with these heroic FBI agents, has been trying to introduce legislation to strengthen the bureau’s woefully inadequate whistleblower protections. Friend’s complaint will be a test case.

In a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray on Aug. 11, Grassley alleged that a committee of FBI field agents had been to see Wray to express the concerns of agents in all 56 field offices across the country that “the FBI has become too politicized in its decision-making.” Grassley further alleges “those concerns were removed from this year’s final report” of the FBI’s Special Agents Advisory Committee.

Wray ignored Grassley’s letter along with a dozen other letters from the dogged Iowa senator alleging gross malfeasance at the bureau.

But unrest is growing among field agents about the weaponization of the FBI against the Biden administration’s political opponents under Wray. He can’t ­ignore it for long.

https://nypost.com/2022/09/21/fbi-hero-paying-the-price-for-exposing-unjust-persecution-of-conservative-americans/

God Bless this man!

>>17561351

This is fucking ridiculous, every head of every department at the FBI needs to be terminated now. The gross and disgusting violations of citizens and our leaders only tells me if they are not stopped dead in their tracks they’ll destroy the country. What they want is a civil war or everyone cowering in fear to tell the truth and expose the evil. What they really is mind controlled robots doing the DS bidding.

I’m so disgusted after reading this article and I really wonder where were these whistleblowers when Trump was in office? I think it was Chris Christie that recommended Wray or maybe Pence, whoever did knew he was a sleeper that would do what the DS told him to do.

>>17561351

This is fucking ridiculous, every head of every department at the FBI needs to be terminated now. The gross and disgusting violations of citizens and our leaders only tells me if they are not stopped dead in their tracks they’ll destroy the country. What they want is a civil war or everyone cowering in fear to tell the truth and expose the evil. What they really is mind controlled robots doing the DS bidding.

I’m so disgusted after reading this article and I really wonder where were these whistleblowers when Trump was in office? I think it was Chris Christie that recommended Wray or maybe Pence, whoever did knew he was a sleeper that would do what the DS told him to do.

>>17561445

Wow so Grassley uses $666 in his post, is he telling people that Bidan Admin is the mark of the beast?

>>17561429

That article was the first time the public gets to know what we know but had no evidence of how corrupt the FBI, its worse than corrupt. They have appointed every supervisor and up that work for the DS.

There’s got to be a major revolt on the agency for this situation to change. Its sick, actually accusing Friend if wrongthink, and constantly threaten his job. The federal department of labor if they were honest, would have a field day suing the FBi for serious violations of employment law. But then on the other hand they only get involved for minorities and they are part of the DS too!

>>17561309

Your argument sucks including your judgement of his speaking ability, but to clarify for you, your obvious inability to see nuanced and specific words, that Trump has said many times on the declassification:

Trump announced many times in tweets and through Kash, when they told us exactly what he declassified, go back to his tweets, and declassification notices in his records. It was everything on Russiagate delusion, HRC and gangs plans to destroy him including secret docs the FBi and DOJ had never released and two or three other investigations.

So if you had remembered any of that, Trump’s language was correct he declassified and ordered the release ofeverythinghe promised he would. He obviously wouldnt release every state secret.

Just because you don’t remember what he said he was declassing & releasing the material does not mean he misspoke.

And you have unusually critical tone towards Trump. Whats your problem?

>>17561510

Thanks

>>17561546

Well he sure has taken s critical and bitter tone towards Trump since that time, so he’s not forgiven even a little bit

>>17561599

Everything at mar a lago was declassified and some of what he had there were the docs he declassified and wanted released to the public

>>17561599

Everything at mar a lago was declassified and some of what he had there were the docs he declassified and wanted released to the public

>>17561585

As they are persecuting them today for J6, someone has to blow the whistle on everyone in government knew the elections were stolen. That would put an end to the J6 committee and all the threats from government for even thinking it was stolen

>>17561585

BARR LIED! FOIA Requests Reveal There Were No DOJ Investigations on Election Fraud After 2020 Election as Bill Barr Claimed (VIDEO)

In December 2020, US Attorney General Bill Barr said there was “no evidence” of widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election.

Barr said there was no evidence of widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election, defying President Donald Trump’s ongoing efforts to reverse the results.

Barr repeated this claim several times since leaving office as President Trump’s Attorney General.

Now there is proof that Bill Barr is and was lying.

On Thursday former Trump adviser Jeffrey Clark, the Director of Litigation at the Center for Renewing America, joined Steve Bannon on The War Room.

Jeffrey Clark told Steve the Center for Renewing America sent out FOIA requests to 12 US Attorney districts from the 2020 battleground states.

Bill Barr sent out a memo on November 9, 2020, saying there should be investigations of the elections.

Jeff Clark told Steve Bannon the FOIA requests have come back from every district but one with NO DOCUMENTS.

No investigations were done as a result of that memo. There is only one of the 12 districts that has not yet come in and that’s the eastern district of Pennsylvania.

The US Attorney of the Eastern District asked to investigate issues in his district. Barr denied the request!

Bill Barr lied to the American public. Now he got caught.

Jeffrey Clark joined The War Room on Thursday to break the news.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/09/bill-barr-lied-foia-requests-reveal-no-doj-investigations-election-fraud-2020-election-bill-barr-claimed-video/

>>17561643

Yeah something wrong with Bobb and Abba, he did set them up. If I keep that in mind I will not be so outraged at the historically seditious acts and punishment they are putting on him and us

I’d like this phase to speed up though

>>17561651

Thats what Sundance believes. I still remember though all the countries him and Durham visited in their investigation. Kash said there are many things durham is releasing they never knew anout

>>17561633

Baier us just trying to rehab his image because his ratings suck. I will never trust anyone at Fox again. Even Tucker you have to take with a grain of salt, and his laugh that he does, is weird

>>17561681

Yeah he acts like it

>>17561584

Add to that a smaller and corruption free government out of DC

>>17561551

We are the ones that choose to stay in the living hell of the knowledge the election was stolen. They don’t want to know and have just moved on. Lazy citizens thats why we are at where we are at