Sessions rescinds Justice Dept. letter asking courts to be wary of stiff fines for poor defendants

The Washington Post ^ | December 21 at 8:08 PM | Matt Zapotosky

[fluorescence]

Attorney General Jeff Sessions is rescinding an Obama-era Justice Department letter that asked local courts across the country to be wary of slapping poor defendants with fines and fees to fill their jurisdictions’ coffers, part of a broad rollback of guidance that Sessions believes overreached.

It’s the latest move in Sessions’s effort to dramatically reshape the Justice Department by undoing many of the reforms imposed by his predecessors and giving the institution a harder edge. Sessions is revoking 25 previous guidance documents dating back decades and covering topics as diverse as ATF procedures and the Americans With Disabilities Act.

In a statement, Sessions said he was ending “the long-standing abuse of issuing rules by simply publishing a letter or posting a web page.”

“Congress has provided for a regulatory process in statute, and we are going to follow it,” Sessions said. “This is good government and prevents confusing the public with improper and wrong advice.”

In less than a year in office, Sessions has imposed a new charging policy that calls for prosecutors to pursue the most serious offenses possible, even when that might trigger stiff mandatory minimum sentences. He has restored the use of private prisons. And he has adjusted the department’s legal stances on issues involving voting rights and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals in ways that put him at odds with his most immediate predecessors.

Sessions previewed the most recent shift in a November speech at the National Lawyers Convention , where he revealed he was directing Justice Department officials to stop issuing guidance documents that try “to impose new obligations on any party outside the executive branch,” saying too that he would “review and repeal existing guidance documents that violate this common-sense principle.”

[Nextrush]

Jeff Sessions publicity time it seems.

Is it related to this?

http://nextrushfree.blogspot.com/2017/12//bunkerville-standoff-attorney-general.html

[rawcatslyentist]

Good job Jeffie!

Rob loot and pillage!

[vooch]

exactly - Sessions believes in big gov’t with no checks and balances. He would get along fine with Stalin

[SunTzuWu]

Sessions believes in big gov’t with no checks and balances.

Are you nuts? This is completely in keeping with checks and balances. 0bama was bypassing Congress by establishing laws by writing them and posting them in the Federal Register. Only Congress has the power to enact law and this move by Sessions reaffirms this.

[gov_bean_ counter]

Sessions is reestablishing the rule of law in the DOJ. Something these F r Yahoos said they wanted.

See tagline.

[trebb]

Sessions ain’t doing what a lot of us want - and certainly not quick enough, but when he does something, it is within the context of the Rule of Law, is developed before it is publicized, and it makes perfect sense - yet those who would make the average shark-jumper seem like a slow breath of sanity need something to carp about.....

[AndyJackson]

This is right. It is not the role of the DOJ to tell the independent judiciary how to do anything. That is done through laws passed by Congress including rules and orders for the operations of the courts and administration of justice and the power to appoint judges granted the President, with the adivse and consent of the Senate.

[super7man]

So the Post says its "undoing many of the reforms imposed by his predecessors" and Sessions said he was ending “the long-standing abuse of issuing rules by simply publishing a letter". So which is it, a reform or an abuse. One man's reform is another man's abuse, I guess.

[vooch]

sessions represents the tyrannical view of gov‘t

he‘d be comfortable in Stalin‘s Soviet Union

[Osage Orange]

Ummmm...wait just a second.

I wonder about Jeff Sessions...but on this..he is right.

[trebb]

sessions represents the tyrannical view of gov‘t

he‘d be comfortable in Stalin‘s Soviet Union

Time will tell...I would imagine that those who feel as you do would also be very concerned about Trump turning into a Stalin....

[vooch]

Trump ?

Trump has a healthy anti-tyranny soul. He is our last hope of reform

[trebb]

Yes - but he did hire Sessions and appears to be abiding with him....

[vooch]

true - but at least Trump has said things that suggest at LEAST he understands the problem. These days that’s considered success

[trebb]

I think there’s still a possibility that Trump and Sessions are working some issues behind the scenes - hope so anyway....time will tell.