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Ken Cuccinelli was elected in 2009 (Virginia and New Jersey are the only states to hold regular statewide elections in odd numbered years) along with Governor Bob McDonald (R), and in that short time he has done what I did not think was possible. He has made “Taliban Bob” look well balanced and mainstream. This is an illusion—Bob McDonald is an extremist who has opposed women’s rights, tacitly supported discrimination and presented the opposing argument to Obama’s State of the Union address—so anyone that makes him seem reasonable must be pretty far gone. Cuccinelli’s biggest claim to fame at the moment is being one of the most outspoken supporters of the legal challenge to the Health Care Reform law passed earlier this year, a suit in which he employs such convincing arguments as “socialism,” and “OBAMACARE!” Channeling John C. Calhoun, Cuccinelli has argued that states rights are infringed upon by the individual mandate, which for some reason does not give states the choice of whether or not to follow federal law. He has also been notable in his opposition to climate science after the so-called “climategate” non-scandal, he demanded the research materials from the University of Virginia, prompting a rare moment in which I, a Virginia Tech student, supported the efforts of something involved with UVA or the city of Charlottesville or any students, professors or alumni thereof (we beat them 42-13 in football last year.) Even more notable to a student at a Virginia public college were his efforts to force discrimination upon Virginia public colleges. Most places of higher learning, being just that, have generally negative attitudes towards discrimination based on artificial categories such as race, gender or sexual orientation. Cuccinelli decided that this was just unacceptable, so he sent off a now infamous letter to public colleges in the state informing them that including sexual orientation as a category in non-discrimination policies was not legal by state law. His justification? Sexual orientation is not a protected class in current statute, a patently absurd reason to deny the schools their right to protect it. Oh yeah, and he also has flirted with birtherism. One would think that after all of this, Cuccinelli would at least take a quick breather before moving on to his next rational-thought-defying implosion, but like a criminal mastermind, he always has another plan lined up in the wings. This week it was a decision that has the binding force of law until reviewed by a federal judge. Virginia law enforcement officials now can check the immigration status of anyone they arrest with the low threshold of reasonable suspicion. If that sounds familiar, it’s because Arizona just did the same thing with the result of a national uproar, billions in lost revenues and eventually a court decision that overturned most parts of the law. If you’re wondering how Cuccinelli expects his opinion to hold after a federal court overturned the same concept in Arizona… well, so am I. I suppose since the case is far from the Supreme Court, he expects changes long before it reaches that level. This seems to not only be horrible policy, but also very shortsighted. Regardless of the reasons and the political implications, Cuccinelli’s decision means one thing definitively - a much hazier future for undocumented workers and all people who, in someone’s subjective view, look like they might be undocumented workers, in Virginia. Real people are going to be really affected because our Attorney General wanted to emulate Arizona. I honestly don’t know what actions can directly be taken against the Attorney General’s decision. Certainly lawsuits will come that will hopefully have the same result as they did in Arizona, but in the meantime, I can’t think to do anything, but protest. If you live in the Commonwealth, make a few calls or maybe even drive down to Richmond. The only other thing I can suggest is to remember this in 2013. If you are lucky enough to reside outside of Virginia and Arizona, you might want to consider contacting your state officials to preemptively discourage similar action. BackComments
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I want to take a break from my normal “Crazy Stuff Republicans Do” posts to bring you a crazy thing that a Republican has done.