Eric Holder was the Assistant Attorney General at the time of the disgraceful shooting of Randy Weaver, the murder of David Koresh and his followers at Waco, and the pardon of Marc Rich.
Now, again, he has shown his dangerous talent for inflaming an already incendiary situation. It seems best that he step down.
It is not simply his role in racializing the national debate over the Trayvon Martin case in a way that probably led directly to the prosecution over-charging Zimmerman (and thus losing the case).
There is a further issue. The issue of stand-your-ground laws need to be addressed by someone with credibility on the subject, an honest broker, not a race-huckster.
Third problem. Holder continues to stir racial feeling by threatening to pursue a civil rights case, even when it has no application, as in the Martin case.
“The Constitution’s Reconstruction Amendments primarily target state officials, not private individuals, for depriving others of their federal rights. Zimmerman was not acting under “color of law” — indeed, the state of Florida has just tried to prosecute him.
Holder may envisage prosecuting Zimmerman under laws prohibiting private conspiracies to deprive people of their federal rights. But that approach would pose serious constitutional problems.
Martin’s killing, however tragic, is purely intra-state, by one private individual against another. There is no broad conspiracy to frustrate federal law, perhaps in silent cooperation with state authorities, as happened in days gone by with the Ku Klux Klan.
The prosecution’s own witnesses admitted at trial that Zimmerman had not acted out of racial bias. The FBI’s findings confirmed that. Even under federal hate crime law, which itself may be unconstitutional, a federal prosecution would be unsuccessful without proof of racial motive.
Holder’s decision is the most recent example of his practice of abusing prosecutorial discretion, misinterpreting the law, and deploying criminal justice for political ends. “