WASHINGTON (AP) — Each Democrats and Republicans alike readied for a unanimous Home vote Tuesday to move a invoice to drive the discharge of the case information on the convicted intercourse offender Jeffrey Epstein.
However in the long run, one lawmaker stood alone in opposition: Republican Rep. Clay Higgins.
Higgins, who’s in his fifth time period representing a congressional district in southwest Louisiana, defined in a prolonged assertion that he was “a principled ‘NO’ on this bill from the beginning.”
He raised among the identical objections that Home Speaker Mike Johnson, one other Louisiana Republican, had with the invoice, but even Johnson mentioned Tuesday he would vote for it as a result of, “None of us want to go on record and in any way be accused of not being for maximum transparency.”
For Higgins, a fervent Trump supporter and a member of the ultra-conservative Home Freedom Caucus, that wasn’t an issue.
He refused to present in to the constructing strain, each inside the Republican base and from survivors of Epstein’s abuse, to move the invoice, whilst each President Donald Trump and Johnson relented of their opposition to the laws.
He mentioned that his concern with the invoice was that it “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,” he added.
Higgins prompt he can be open to voting for the invoice if the Senate amended it to guard the privateness of these “who are named but not criminally implicated.” However simply hours later, the Senate handed the invoice via unanimous consent, leaving Higgins the one lawmaker in Congress on report towards the laws.
But Higgins can also be no stranger to controversy. As a former regulation enforcement officer, he confronted a sequence of allegations of misconduct and have become politically concerned after reaching viral fame by creating brash Crime Stoppers movies.
It earned him the nickname by media shops as “Cajun John Wayne,” and he’s adopted up the moniker by difficult individuals on social media to fights.
In 2020, a social media publish by the congressman ― promising the usage of drive towards armed protesters ― was eliminated by Fb for violating the corporate’s violence and incitement insurance policies.
In Congress, he chairs the subcommittee of the Home Oversight Committee that initiated a subpoena of the Division of Justice for the Epstein case information. However even when Democrats on the subcommittee satisfied a number of Republicans to vote with them to subject the subpoena, Higgins was one of many few who stood opposed. He additionally pressed to have the subcommittee subpoena former President Invoice Clinton.
“I’ve never handled a subpoena like this. This is some fascinating stuff,” Higgins mentioned on the time. On Tuesday, he pointed to the oversight panel’s work to analyze the federal government’s dealing with of the Epstein, saying that it was being carried out “in a manner that provides all due protections for innocent Americans.”
Final 12 months, Higgins additionally confronted an try by Democrats to censure him for racist feedback he had made about Haitian immigrants after Trump’s personal feedback concerning the Haitian group in Springfield, Ohio.
In a social media publish, Higgins known as Haitians “wild. Eating pets, vudu, nastiest country in the western hemisphere, cults, slapstick gangsters.”
However after members of the Congressional Black Caucus, a bunch of Democratic lawmakers, confronted him concerning the publish, Higgins deleted it and partially walked again the feedback, saying they have been supposed for gang members.
On the time, Johnson defended Higgins, calling him “a very frank and outspoken person.” “He’s also a very principled man,” Johnson added.
Related Press author Sara Cline in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, contributed to this report.
