San Francisco Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi, known as a staunch supporter of the city’s sanctuary status, was voted out of office Tuesday night.
Advertisement
Partial returns show Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi losing to retired sheriff’s official Vicki Hennessy. Mirkarimi was already fighting for his political life. Of the 121,978 votes cast, 61.09 percent of voters supported her, compared to the 32.9 percent for Mirkarimi. Mirkarimi & his workplace received heavy criticism after Mexican unlawful immigrant Francisco Sanchez allegedly shot & killed 32-year-old Kate Steinle on San Francisco’s waterfront Jul. 1. Mirkarimi, nonetheless, repeatedly defended his decision.
There’s something unusual going on in the City by the Bay after yesterday’s municipal elections, but I suspect that it’s far too early to get very excited about it. San Francisco voters went to the polls and rejected their sheriff who had become something of the face of the so called “sanctuary city” and they did so by a wide margin.
Mirkarimi’s refusal to cooperate with federal immigration officials in holding Sanchez led directly to a woman’s death.
Hennessy also told the Chronicle that, while she thought the city’s sanctuary status had an honorable objective of establishing trust with the immigrant community, the 32-year-old who allegedly killed Steinle should have been deported. “He was a serial offender who had committed multiple felonies”.
But since then, the sheriff’s oversight of the department has been plagued by other high-profile mishaps and controversies seen as contributing to his defeat. He had his driver’s license briefly suspended for failing to properly report a minor accident while driving a department-issued auto, and he also flunked a marksmanship test. Mirkarimi, who previously served for seven years on the Board of Supervisors, has faced a series of problems since taking office as sheriff in 2012, starting with domestic violence allegations stemming from an incident in which he grabbed his wife’s arm during an argument just days before being sworn in.
Advertisement
Mirkarimi’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment from TheBlaze.
