I am having a hard time with this particular case. The general trend I have seen over all these immigration clashes tends to be: first, the deportation was fully justified, while second, the Democratic reaction to the deportation is overblown, and third, the Republican reaction to the Democratic reaction overstates the Democrats’ (official) concern. In other words, if politicians just shut up and let ICE do its job, events would be a lot quieter, and Democrats would appear less supportive of heinous criminal behavior, and Republicans would appear less heartless.

In general, I have to support every effort to ensure that deportations have all their i’s dotted and t’s crossed. Even in the face of overwhelming numbers of illegals that our system cannot process in any timely fashion, I will approve (even if I find it frustrating) taking time to make sure the person being deported is really here illegally and deserving of deportation. And while I approve of deporting illegals generally, I also believe prudence dictates targeting the easy, low-hanging fruit, simply because of the resource challenges.

In the case of Tou Lue Vang, this seems to be one of those low-hanging fruit. Due process had been observed. He had committed a crime that society views as the worst crime possible to commit. Removing him from the country should have been uncontested. Instead, the Democrats stepped on a rake. Walz and his team pardoned Vang over the objections of prosecution. Prosecution indicated that the victim’s family was pressuring her not to cooperate with the case, which means her family was somewhat complicit in Vang’s abuse.

(As a note, I have heard stories that are absolutely horrifying about abuse that not only occurred from family members, but were facilitated by family members. Fathers who handed daughters over to uncles for abuse. Parents that prostituted their children out. So it is entirely possible the victim was handed to Vang by her parents. I also found out from the same article I linked to that Vang later married his victim’s sister. I would suggest there is something very unhealthy going in that entire extended family.)

Prosecution also noted that while Vang expressed remorse for his crimes, he only cited how it impacted his family, not how his abuse impacted his victim. Prosecution also pointed to the fact in the original case, he blamed his victim as just as culpable, dismissed the abuse as no big deal, and bribed his victim to keep her from revealing the abuse. The board ultimately granted the pardon based on the victim providing a letter approving Vang’s pardon and saying she had forgiven him. As tepid as her statement was, and couple with how her family pressured her not to cooperate with the original investigation, I find it difficult to believe that such a forgiveness letter itself wasn’t coerced.

However, having now cast all kinds of speculative aspersions on the family, I can also believe that Vang had an inappropriate fixation on his victim that has since been broken, in part because of his conviction, and in part because of his marriage. These could have lined him out, perhaps evidenced by going twenty years without further crimes (that we know of). There’s a great deal of research into the patterns of sex offenders that show that the longer one goes without offending, the less risk there is of reoffense, and if one was younger than 25 at the time of offending, there is a good chance that maturation will also greatly decrease the risk of reoffense. In addition, stable family and work life also lead to a decrease in risk.

Now for the deportation, my understanding (which is always open to correction) is that Vang was in the country legally as a refugee, but his conviction lost him his legal status, and he should have been deported. However, that deportation was stayed, and he remained under federal supervision until 2019. But I believe the threat of deportation remained a reality, and it became an urgent matter as Trump ramped up deportations in general. Vang appealed for a gubernatorial pardon, which if this article is correct, would qualify Vang for deportation relief, as the reason for his deportation was based on his conviction. The current statutes state that

Clauses (i), (ii), (iii), and (iv) shall not apply in the case of an alien with respect to a criminal conviction if the alien subsequent to the criminal conviction has been granted a full and unconditional pardon by the President of the United States or by the Governor of any of the several States.

So, in theory, the pardon would make the case that Vang was no longer subject to deportation, but he would have had to still reopen his case to have the grounds for deportation dismissed. It may be the case that Vang was still in the process of filing to have his deportation order dismissed when he was deported. If any of this is incorrect, what I’ll say next doesn’t hold up. But if Vang had legal means to have his deportation dismissed, and was not permitted to make use of those channels, one could argue that his deportation did deny him due process.

What is abundantly clear, though, is that the true human matters in this case have been obscured by politics. I don’t believe for an instant that Walz and his board are genuinely concerned about Vang, Vang’s children, Vang’s victim, protecting society, or any such thing. This appears to me to be entirely politically motivated, with Vang only receiving a pardon — not for any rehabilitation he did or did not demonstrate — in order to interfere with a Trump initiative. It has all the hallmarks of the way Democrats operate: a nuanced case where they can throw a wrench into the axles of Trump’s administration, yet have plausible deniability in case they are challenged about their motives. After all, the board has the cover that the pardon does not grant instant relief from deportation for Vang, so they can make it seem independent of the deportation issue, all the while wink-wink-nudge-nudging their political allies at how they stymied Trump.

But this also seems to strike to the increasing tone-deafness of the Democratic party, who can’t seem to understand that their stances in so many cases are running counter to general opinion? Now, I can understand being willing to fight for the undesirables to ensure they have proper legal recourse, and doing the right thing in such circumstances does have to run against the general opinion. But we’ve seen that the Democratic party doesn’t play by those rules, in the way they blacklist anyone who dares legally represent a Trump ally, dox conservatives (like DataRepublican) for providing conservative analysis and opinions, and cancel anyone, conservatives if they can, but even liberals who stray from the ranch, for holding improper opinions. So what in the world would make the Democrats go to the mat for a convicted sex-offender? The only conclusion I can reach is they are so fervent to stick it to Trump that they don’t realize or don’t care how badly this looks at a national scale.

So back to my original three points: the deportation of Vang was absolutely justified, until his politically-motivated pardon made the waters murky. Democrats have been crying foul over this, but their crocodile tears only come after they have muddied the waters. And the Republican outrage actually seems pretty grounded, given the way the Democrats have manipulated this case. But I can’t understand this, from the standpoint that if the Democrats want to actually retake the House and Senate, the Machiavellian calculation should have led them to abandon Vang to his own devices.