Senator Josh Hawley is asking for AG Barr to open a civil rights investigation into the corrupt St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner who is targeting the McCloskeys for defending themselves against the BLM mob. As you know, she had law enforcement seize their guns last weekend:
Here’s more from KMOV:
Senator Josh Hawley is calling for a federal civil rights investigation into St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner.
Thursday morning Hawley sent a letter to Attorney General William Barr about the “targeting of the McCloskey family for using firearms to defend themselves and their property against a mob of protesters.”
Hawley claims Gardner has abused her power in seizing the couple’s guns and pursuing a possible indictment.
As of Thursday morning, the McCloskeys have not been charged with anything for the June 28 incident that drew national attention.
Below is the full letter from Hawley from KMOV for you to read:
Dear Attorney General Barr:
As you are well aware, the country is facing a moment of significant public unrest and discord. As many Americans are peacefully exercising their constitutional rights to free speech and protest throughout the country, still others are exploiting this moment as an opportunity to sow violence and destruction. Too often, peaceful demonstrations have devolved into tense standoffs or violent riots, with threats and attacks on businesses, innocent bystanders, and law enforcement officers.
One such incident occurred in St. Louis, Missouri, where a family reportedly faced a mass of demonstrators trespassing on their property and threatening them. When help from the police or from nearby security failed to arrive, this family, the McCloskeys, did what any reasonable person would do: they retrieved their lawfully owned firearms and defended their property and their lives. The confrontation was resolved with no one being hurt.
Unfortunately, this family is facing new threats, not from demonstrators but from the local government. St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner is now threatening to prosecute not the trespassers, but the McCloskeys, and she is using the powers of her office to target them. Her office has seized their firearms, and police have applied for warrants in the case, with an indictment believed to be imminent.1
This is an unacceptable abuse of power and threat to the Second Amendment, and I urge you to consider a federal civil rights investigation into the St. Louis Circuit Attorney’s Office to determine whether this investigation and impending prosecution violates this family’s constitutional rights. There is no question under Missouri law that the McCloskeys had the right to own and use their firearms to protect themselves from threatened violence, and that any criminal prosecution for these actions is legally unsound. The only possible motivation for the investigation, then, is a politically motivated attempt to punish this family for exercising their Second Amendment rights. Indeed, this is part of a troubling pattern of politically motivated prosecutorial decisions by the St. Louis Circuit Attorney, who has not seen fit to prosecute many violent offenders, 2 and who has expressed hostility to gun rights in the past. 3 Recently, reports indicate that she declined to pursue charges against dozens of individuals arrested during a weekend of riots in the city.4
The Second Amendment is not a second-class right. No family should face the threat of harassment or malicious prosecution for exercising that right. The Department of Justice must ensure that all Americans’ rights are protected from this kind of abuse of power. Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Sincerely,
Josh Hawley U.S. Senator
I’m glad Hawley sent this letter and I hope AG Barr puts a US Attorney on the case and they do something about this. Corrupt prosecutors like Gardner need to be put in jail and the rights of law abiding families like the McCloskeys need to be protected.
Via TRS
