The disgraced former Culpeper County sheriff who was pardoned by Donald Trump after being sentenced to 10 years in federal prison for accepting $75,000 in bribes just happened to have issued a deputy badge to White House border czar Tom Homan in 2020.
NBC4 Washington reported on Tuesday that police from Arlington contacted the current sheriff in Culpeper County, Tim Chilton, to tell him that a woman had found identification and a badge identifying Homan in a used Cadillac that she purchased in 2023.
The items, per the report, were found in “a hidden compartment inside one of the glove boxes in the Cadillac.”
The White House told the TV station that Homan never did any work for Culpeper County, and “wasn’t aware of any allegations/rumors of the sheriff accepting bribes.”
Uh, huh.
“The sheriff” mentioned by the Trumpers there is not the current guy, but his predecessor, Scott Jenkins, who was convicted in 2024 on one count of conspiracy, four counts of honest services fraud and seven counts of bribery concerning programs receiving federal funds.
ICYMI
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According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, Jenkins accepted cash bribes and bribes in the form of campaign contributions from co-defendants Rick Rahim, Fredric Gumbinner and James Metcalf, as well as at least five others, including two FBI undercover agents.
In return for the bribes, Jenkins appointed the money guys as auxiliary deputy sheriffs, a sworn law-enforcement position, and issued them official Culpeper County Sheriff’s Office badges and credentials.
The fake deputies were not trained or vetted and did not render any legitimate services to the sheriff’s office or the citizens of Culpeper County, per the court records of the trial.
That the people who paid bribes were found to have not done anything meaningful with their fake badges would seem to be in line with what the Trump regime had to say in defense of Tom Homan.
The defense goes into detail to say that Homan knew Jenkins from “several events,” whatever that’s supposed to mean, and had requested to use the sheriff’s firing range to complete a legally required firearms test.
Jenkins, per Team Trump, offered to make Homan a reserve deputy to provide advice on the 287(g) immigration enforcement program and potential partnerships with ICE.
Yeah, sure, like our guy, Scott Jenkins, needed advice on how to push the limits of the law.
Jenkins, who was the elected sheriff in Culpeper County from 2012-2023, was a self-styled “constitutional sheriff,” in line with the far-right extremist doctrine that holds that sheriffs have unchecked authority to interpret and enforce the Constitution within their jurisdictions.
Sounds like a certain president who thinks he has unchecked authority to interpret, enforce and rewrite the Constitution on a whim.
What else do we need to know about this Scott Jenkins guy – well, he vowed in 2020 to “deputize thousands of my citizens” to circumvent gun-control regulations being debated by the Virginia General Assembly.
Think that one through: thousands of MAGA gun nuts running around the county thinking they’re sheriff’s deputies.
That would make the drive up 29 from Charlottesville to DC so much more fun, would it not?
One other thing to know about Scott Jenkins: the post he made to the sheriff’s office Facebook page in 2020, in which he wrote that “the Black Lives Matter movement is not peaceful and at their heart are violent. They may bring their violence to any community at any time and especially where they see weakness in local government officials.”
Given the opportunity to walk back the comment, Jenkins had this to say to a DC TV station:
“It’s one thing to be against what they consider excessive force or high-profile incidents they are talking about more recently. It’s one thing to have strong feelings about that, I understand, and they want their voices heard. I’m talking about a group that they are not saying they’re anti-law enforcement and that we only want to defund, they’re saying we want to kill and assault law enforcement. There’s a big difference there,” Jenkins said.
Sounds like Scott Jenkins and Tom Homan, getting to know each other at the “several events” reported to us by the White House, would have gotten along famously.
Too bad they never actually worked together.
Eye roll.
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Chris Graham
