All about anti-LGBTQ+ Republican Clay Higgins, the lone vote against Epstein files release

https://fed.brid.gy/r/https://www.advocate.com/politics/all-about-clay-higgins

Higgins casts lone ‘no’ vote on Epstein files release

This story was first reported by Louisiana Illuminator and republished with permission.

U.S. Rep. Clay Higgins, R-Lafayette, cast the lone vote Tuesday against a congressional measure to compel the release unclassified investigative files from the FBI’s case against convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. But there is a possibility he could eventually support it, he said.

Higgins has consistently positioned his views alongside those of President Trump, who flipped his stance Sunday and encouraged lawmakers to approve the release of the Epstein files. U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-Benton, followed suit, urging its passage after weeks of resisting bipartisan calls to bring the matter up for a vote.

In a post on the social media platform X, Higgins explained his decision to stand apart from his 427 House colleagues who approved the measure, saying that he had been “a principled ‘NO’ on this bill from the beginning.”

“What was wrong with the bill three months ago is still wrong today. It abandons 250 years of criminal justice procedure in America,” Higgins said. “As written, this bill reveals and injures thousands of innocent people – witnesses, people who provided alibis, family members, etc. If enacted in its current form, this type of broad reveal of criminal investigative files, released to a rabid media, will absolutely result in innocent people being hurt. Not by my vote.”

The requests laid out in City Council Chair Kenneth Boudreaux’s letter to the administration revolve around costs and potential property damage to Downtown.

Higgins added that the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, of which he is a member, is “conducting a thorough investigation that has already released well over 60,000 pages of documents from the Epstein case.”

“That effort will continue in a manner that provides all due protections for innocent Americans,” the congressman wrote. “If the Senate amends the bill to properly address privacy of victims and other Americans, who are named but not criminally implicated, then I will vote for that bill when it comes back to the House.”

Morgan Lamandre is executive director for Sexual Trauma Awareness and Response, the state’s largest organization serving survivors of sexual assault. Reached by email, she said Higgins’ explanation for voting against the bill is not consistent with its actual text.

“The only people the bill does not protect are powerful adults connected to Epstein’s criminal activities,” Lamandre said. “Higgins is treating the potential embarrassment of those individuals as if they are ‘innocent people.’ It is also hard to believe he has developed a sudden concern for due process given his history in law enforcement, when he routinely assumed guilt in public videos long before suspects were ever arrested or stepped into a courtroom.”

Before he won Louisiana’s 3rd Congressional District seat in 2016, Higgins was a law enforcement officer in Opelousas, Port Barre and with the St. Landry Parish Sheriff’s Office. As a public information officer for the sheriff, Higgins gained viral fame for his Crime Stoppers segments on Acadiana television. His tough-on-crime talk often presumed the guilt of the at-large suspects highlighted in the videos.

Lamandre also noted Higgins’ statement stressed “witnesses, people who provided alibis, family members, etc.,” but had no reference to survivors or sexual abuse linked to Epstein’s crimes.

“His concern seems directed at everyone except for the hundreds of exploited children and adults whose abuse is the reason these records matter in the first place,” she said.

When the entire political spectrum—from #Biden to #Trump, progressives to #MAGA conservatives—agrees the public deserves full disclosure of the Epstein files, what exactly is the one dissenting lawmaker protecting?

#ClayHiggins #Epsteinfiles #JeffreyEpstein #Republicans #Democrats #DonaldTrump

https://marketinsider.net/things-you-should-know-about-clay-higgins-who-opposed-releasing-the-epstein-files/

Between Congress and the Senate there was only one no vote cast against releasing the Epstein files.

It looks like Clay Higgins from Louisiana might be hiding a little something of his own.

#ClayHiggins #trump #epstein #epstein #EpsteinFiles #MAGA #republicans #louisiana #news