Republican Attorneys General from Alabama, Alaska, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Virginia, and West Virginia today joined President Trump and United States Attorney General Bondi at the United States Department of Justice for a discussion on Keeping America Safe.
Our nation’s Republican AGs are supportive of the Trump Administration’s tough-on-crime policies that keep Americans safe. The Biden-Harris Administration’s open border policies allowed millions of illegal immigrants, criminals, and illicit drugs to flow across the southern border, resulting in chaos in our streets and the deaths of many Americans. President Trump and his administration have acted swiftly to reverse these policies and AGs across the country have worked to implement President Trump’s agenda to keep Americans safe.
Attorneys General Marshall (AL), Uthmeier (FL), Sunday (PA), Wilson (SC), Jackley (SD), Miyares (VA), and McCuskey (WV) held a press conference ahead of their meeting at the United States Department of Justice, where they discussed the importance of a strong partnership with the Trump Administration to decrease violent crime and drug trafficking. To view a recording of the press conference, please click HERE.
“I can tell you it is remarkably refreshing to have an Attorney General, who in her confirmation hearing and since the time she’s taken office, has placed an emphasis on violent crime. As a result of that priority, the people in Alabama will be safer and look forward to being able to work with the Trump Administration,” said Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall. Marshall, who has been a prosecutor for nearly 30 years, was a national leader in fighting the Biden Administration’s disastrous open-border policies that put gasoline on the fire of the drug trafficking and violent crime crisis in the United States.
Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier, who was appointed less than one month ago, has already taken violent crime head-on, successfully obtaining a conviction in the prosecution of a fentanyl trafficker and, in a separate case, taking down more than 30 fentanyl and cocaine traffickers. “In Florida, we’re proud to announce we’ve had a 50-year crime low,” Uthmeier said. “We’re the first state in the country that’s had all of our statewide law enforcement and sheriffs get certified to partner with ICE and the 287(g) program.”
Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday, who was first elected Attorney General last fall, has taken his experience as a career prosecutor to target violent crime across the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. “I’m a career prosecutor and I was a district attorney in York County, Pennsylvania, and rarely have I seen pain like I’ve seen when I spoke with parents who have slowly watched their children drift away into addiction,” said Sunday. “Fentanyl has torn families apart, impacted our economy, and impacted public safety. If our communities aren’t safe, literally nothing else matters, but you cannot achieve maximum public safety and keep families safe if you’re by yourself. I cannot tell you how excited I am as Attorney General to have partners like President Trump and Attorney General Bondi who have that same vision and that same mission of working together every single day to decrease the amount of fentanyl coming into our communities and killing our children.”
South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson has been on the forefront of fighting violent crime and drug trafficking for nearly 15 years as Attorney General, and previously as a prosecutor. He strengthened South Carolina’s human trafficking laws and has been a champion for the rights of crime victims. “When people ask me what keeps me up at night, I talk about a lot of the problems originating at the southern border of the United States,” said Wilson. “Roughly two months ago, with the election of President Trump, America plugged the holes in the boat, but the water is still in the boat. The consequences of the policies that were implemented by the previous Administration have created a lot of problems for our states. Gang activity, illegal immigration, and of course, probably most importantly, the fentanyl that is being trafficked into our respective states. I had the opportunity to serve for eight years with our current United States Attorney General Pam Bondi and what she’s doing at the Justice Department is going to be so incredibly helpful to all of us.”
South Dakota Attorney General Marty Jackley, who previously served as United States Attorney for the District of South Dakota, understands the importance of strong partnerships between local, state, and federal law enforcement. “When you look at South Dakota, a Midwestern state in the heartland of America, last year alone we confiscated 18.2 pounds of fentanyl, enough to kill our population four to five times,” said Jackley. “That’s how important these partnerships are. When you look at what General Bondi is doing right now, from high intensity drug trafficking task forces to internet crimes against children and fighting human trafficking, these are essential partnerships that are working across the United States and working in South Dakota.”
Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares recently led a 25-state coalition urging the U.S. Senate to permanently classify fentanyl analogues as Schedule I substances, closing the loophole that drug traffickers exploit. He has positioned the Commonwealth of Virginia at the forefront of the battle against fentanyl, adopting a comprehensive and aggressive strategy that combines hands-on community outreach, innovative public education campaigns, and assertive, bipartisan legislative action. Thanks to Miyares’ leadership, in the past year alone, Virginia has experienced a 23.3% drop in fatal drug overdoses, placing Virginia in the top three states in the nation for reducing overdose deaths. Miyares said, “My colleagues and I begged the Biden Administration not just to get some control over the border, but to declare the cartels a foreign terrorist organization. The Sinaloa cartel, in my personal opinion, is the most dangerous criminal enterprise on the planet, I would argue probably in the history of the world. They have decided to conduct chemical warfare on our children. They have created an unholy alliance with the Communist Party of China and they have now taken away so many of our children in our community. We begged the Biden Administration to do something. I would argue they did next to nothing. So, I cannot tell you how refreshing it is to work with the Trump Administration. I’ve received more phone calls from the Department of Justice on how we can collaborate and work together in the first 30 days under General Bondi than I did in my previous three years as Attorney General.”
West Virginia Attorney General J.B. McCuskey, who has been on the job for less than three months, remarked, “West Virginia has been the epicenter of the opioid and fentanyl crisis for the last 30 years, and the destruction that it’s left on our people and our economy is palatable. We have more than 7,000 children in foster care because they were born to families who were struggling with drug addiction. We have historic rates of job loss in southern West Virginia, so I am excited to see the border get closed and to see these criminal gangs get treated the way that they should be by the Justice Department, and that means either deported or put into jail.” Among McCuskey’s first acts as Attorney General was the creation of a Director of Substance Abuse Prevention and Recovery, to aid those struggling with substance abuse disorder and prevent more people from being ravaged by drugs.