Senator Padilla guilty of disobeying police, resisting arrest … and bad acting

California Senator Alex Padilla was recently ejected from a news conference being held by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.  Noem was briefing the press on the status of ICE enforcement when Padilla began speaking loudly and started to approach the podium.  He was asked to leave by police but resisted first by not obeying a police order (a crime) and then physically resisting their efforts to remove him – essentially committing battery on police officers. (a more serious crime).

Since the much larger Padilla was physically engaging with police like a street thug even after being ejected from the room, three officers were needed to take him down and cuff him. Padilla was temporarily detained and then released when his identity was established.

The incident has again enflamed the hair of the radical left in the Democratic Party and the Fourth Estate.  Their hyperbolic spin is designed to convince the American people that we live in a Trump-imposed authoritarian police state portending the end of the American experiment in democracy. 

There are several elements of the Padilla event that strongly suggest it was all a staged performance.

1. Padilla was dressed in casual clothes.
2. He was not wearing his Senate security Identification pin which is recognized by most police – especially the federal officers protecting Noem.
3. He was not accompanied by obvious aides, as senators almost always are.
4. Neither Padilla nor any aides made his presence as a senator known to anyone prior to or as he arrived.  That is virtually unheard of.
5. He started talking over Noem while approaching Noem.  That is a signal for security to intervene.  He immediately resisted.
6. There is no reason to believe that police knew who he was.

Everything Padilla did has the markings of a set-up – political performance art.  He seemed to do everything possible to conceal his identity and get the response he got – a perfectly appropriate response by police charged with protecting Noem in a political atmosphere steeped in anger and violence.

Several news reports described the incident as Padilla being “manhandled” by federal officers.  Hardly.  A more apt description was Padilla assaulting officers by disobeying orders and then resisting efforts to remove him from the room.  He was fighting them.  In fact, it took several officers to finally restrain and cuff him.

The officers are not some sort of Gestapo — as the left portrays.  They are long-time law enforcement officers whose only interest is to protect the person they are assigned to protect.  If there is any culprit in this scenario, it has to be Padillo.

Should Padilla be prosecuted?  You may recall Scott Smith, the father of a sexually abused daughter who was ejected and arrested for allegedly speaking up at a school board meeting in Loudoun County, Virginia.  He was walked out by police, screaming but not resisting.  Nonetheless, Smith was prosecuted by the county district attorney and sentenced to 10 days jail.  He was subsequently pardoned by Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin.

If there is equal justice, Padilla should be charged, and let the justice system do its work.  That is what would happen if the rule-of-law is applicable in all cases and if “no man is above the law.”  BUT … do not hold your breath. Senators consider themselves above the law — as do virtually every other elected official.  And that is how they are usually treated.

At least that has been the case until the Trump administration has taken the approach that if you do the crime, you do the time – even judges and elected officials.  The arrests and indictments of Wisconsin Judge Hannah Dugan and New Jersey Congresswoman LaMonica McIver is a good sign that the rule-of-law has meaning again.  Like Dugan and McIver, the video evidence suggests that Padilla crossed into a crime – not the worst, but a crime, nonetheless. 

Those on the left are shocked by police officers taking down A UNITED STATES SENATOR!!!  Perhaps they should be shocked by the senator’s behavior.

Yes!  Yes!  Yes!  I, too, hear all those hysterical cries emanating from left field.  They are claiming these are the actions of an authoritarian regime that his crushing American democracy.   They have been singing that tune for more than four years – and it has no more appeal today than when they started.  It has no more validity today than those other false narratives Democrats and the crony press carried out — Trump’s campaign colluding with Russia … the fraudulent Steele Dossier …  Hunter’s laptop was Russian chicanery … and Joe Biden is sharp as a tack.

I do not think that an obvious and stupid political trick is a capital offense, but it would be refreshing to see Padilla be judged by a jury of his peers or an impartial judge (ß oxymoron alert) – and if guilty, spend a couple of nights in the hoosegow.  (I bet this commentary gets a lot of whataboutism responses from folks who distract rather than deal with the topic.  LOL).

So, there ‘tis.