The Daily Signal - Virginia’s Top Cop: Jason Miyares on Law, Rights, and Immigration

Episode Date: July 8, 2025

As the 249th anniversary of the nation has passed and we begin a yearlong series of community celebrations of Virginia’s role in the founding of the United States of America, it needs seemingly constant refresher that in order to secure our rights we need to be a nation of laws that establish the appropriate punishments if someone transgresses your rights. Those laws require law enforcement officers and in Virginia, the apex of that list is the Attorney General. The Daily Signal spent some time with Jason Miyares on a number of topics including; “How does the son of an immigrant feel about deporting the migrants that were let into the Country and the Commonwealth over the past four years?” Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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We'd love to talk, business. Thanks for listening to this bonus episode of the Daily Signal podcast. I'm your host, Joe Thomas, Virginia correspondent for The Daily Signal. Before we dive into today's interview, I want to thank you for tuning in today. If you're a first-time listener, The Daily Signal, brings you fact-based reporting and conservative commentary on politics, policy, and culture. And I hope you join our band of regular listeners to our podcast. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe and also take a little bit of.

moment to rate and review us wherever you get your podcast. You can find additional content at DailySignal.com. Now, let's get started with today's conversation right after this. First thing today and the Attorney General of the Commonwealth of Virginia, Jason Miaris, taking a little time out from trying to, A, you know, keep the laws enforced in Virginia and then B, oh, run for reelection as well. Jason, thank you for. squeezing some time out for us. How are you doing this morning? I'm doing great. How are you? Excellent. Excellent. Thank you again for everything you've been doing. As the incumbent in the statewide race, I know Winsome is incumbent as lieutenant governor, but talk about your role as sort of the guy

who's been through this before for the ticket now as summer begins and all the fairs and all the all the sweaty door knocking has to get started. Well, I mean, listen, I get the great joy from the next couple months of asking Virginians to rehire me to hire them, to protect them as attorney general. I like to say we're the people's protector. We've had an incredible record of protecting Virginians, not just from criminal misconduct, but corporate misconduct as well. And so we're proud of the work that we've done and where we were in Virginia when we took office versus where we are today is really night and day. So we're proud of our record. And it's a great joy now to just be able to share that with Virginians.

Talk about, and I was watching the story about the early release challenge. And talk about, you know, this because I think people misunderstand what is going on and why people need to understand that serving out your term in prison for crimes you committed is important. Well, let me tell your listeners where Virginia was before we got in the truth in sentencing. George Allen, a great governor of Virginia in the 1990s, prior to him taking office, you had a revolving door in a criminal justice system or on average you served about one-fourth or one-fifth of your sentence. So if you were sentenced to 20 years and rape, you would actually be getting out in four or five years. That's the world Virginia was in prior to him taking office. A lot of foreign lessons learned, and he implemented truth in sentencing, which says if you get 20 years, you have to serve at least 85% of that. that sentence. In other words, you do the crime, you're going to do the crime. Or you're going to do the time. And our public safety record showed that at the time. The crime rate plummeted. And then they say, the only thing you learn from history is nobody learns from history. You had a lot of these social justice warriors that got power under the previous governor, Ralph Northam. And they decided,

even though this is Virginia was at the time one of the safest state of its size in the country, they wanted to change a lot of the hard progress we had made in keeping Virginia safe. And so They decided they wanted to get rid of truth and sentencing, and they brought back something called the enhanced earned sentence credits. I just called the early release program in the Ralph Thortham. And essentially allowed you to get up to, you know, 50% off your sentence, depending on the category of crime. And so it became what Virginia was before where people were getting out with years upon years on their sentence. The worst, the crime, the more time potentially could get off your sentence. And so we just saw, and we.

We posed it. We warned them. We said if this comes out, they're going to be innocent Virginians. Over nine, just fiscal year, 2023. So this bill got passed in 2021, went to effect in 2022. So now we're starting to see the data of this, of the Northam Early Release program, which my opponent, Jay Jones, was a champion of. And this is what we've seen. Just the fiscal year, 2022, over 9,600 inmates were released early. Roughly 50% of them, were re-arrested. So think about that. That's over 4,500 new victims in Virginia that would not be victims of crime, but for the foolish policies of this criminal first, a victim-last mindset, that decided we're going to ignore the victims, we're going to care more about felons than

would occur about the safety of Virginians, and they put them back on the street where they promptly had to be re-arrested within that is a stunning number. And we're seeing similar disturbing numbers of 2000 coming up in 2024. Well, and it seems like it's closely related to what Terry McColliffe did when he gave mass restoration of voting rights to some people who were on the FBI's most wanted list, some people who were back in jail when he did it. Because there was no due process to it. Nobody looked and said, hey, has this guy earned early release or not? Well, what you had was the reality of, in the case of McCullough, he had somebody who was literally arrested for capital, murder in sitting in a prison in West Virginia was notified that his rights have been restored

to vote in the Commonwealth of Virginia. That's how absurd it was. They never even bothered to see if these people were actually back and incarcerated again. And so, again, this is a criminal first victim last mindset. The great irony of all this, Joe, is that there is nothing new under the sun, as scripture says. There's not a single social justice, quote, unquote, reform. They're advocating that was not already tried with disaster.

results in the 1970s. Casualist bail, early release of violent offenders, no truth and sentencing. That was all part of the so-called enlightened reforms of the 70s that had grappled so many people's minds in the criminal justice system. They implemented it, and the result was a crime explosion in the 80s, and in the 90s we pushed back, brought back truth and sentencing, brought back common sense, and these people have all forgotten those hard lessons. That's part of my frustration is this is not newer novel. These reforms have already been tried. They don't work.

But these individuals are in a left-wing ideological straitjacket. They cannot get out from. And so when we pointed out at a press conference early this week, the number of Virginians that have been hurt by these people getting out early and re-wrecked, including a mom whose daughter was killed. Somebody got out early and he turned his car into a two-ton weapon and had tragically taken her daughter's life. the Senate majority, the Democratic leader in the state Senate just said, well, that's just a one-off.

And AGMIR is just finding single people's pains. 50% re-arrest means there's thousands of Virginians that have been re-victimized by this dishonest, lenient early-release program that's hurting Virginians. Jason Miaris is honest. He is the Attorney General for the Commonwealth of Virginia. I know Governor Yonkin just was in Chesterfield with the state police talking about working with. immigration and customs enforcement. I really wanted to ask you about this, A, as Virginia's lawyer, and the top cop air quotes in Virginia, but also as the child of an immigrant, because the media is wheeling out, you know, every possible, oh, this guy came here from Guatemala, this guy came

here from Kosovo. Your mom immigrated here from Cuba, escaping, you know, Castro. But your out here and you're saying, no, we need to have the rule of law. Explain all that for folks who don't see the difference. Yeah. Well, listen, America is an incredibly generous country. We allow one million legal immigrants a year, but what we don't like is to be, is to feel like we're being taken advantage of it. So when my mother came, she flight Cuba to Spain. She became a legal green card holder prior to them allowing her to get her green card. She had to produce an affidavit that she would not be awarded the state. She would not cost taxpayers money. She had to do a full medical and criminal background check, right? They had check her physical health before they

were allowed. That is very different than the individuals that decide to cut in line and decide to basically break the law and they come here. And that's why you've seen the greatest shift towards the GOP on illegal immigration are new Americans, those that have done it the right way. It goes back to great school. Nobody likes it when you cut in line, right? We did it the right way. You need to do it the right way. And I know if this folks at CNN are always shocked at these numbers, but not if you actually talk to those and so many of different immigrant communities that have come here legally and they've done it the right way. That's number one. Number two, when you do that citizenship oath, and that's one of my earliest memories, was seeing my mother become a U.S. citizen, that is a moment where you take an oath of

allegiance to the United States to our Constitution, and you swear off any foreign allegiance to another prince or king or government. It is an incredibly powerful moving moment. Those that have come here illegally never do that. They never do a background check. They never do a medical history. They never have to survive an affidavit saying you're not going to be a warded of the state. And they sure don't take that oath of allegiance to this country.

There is an absolutely Grand Canyon difference between those that have done it the right way and played by the rules. And those of the side that come over our border in a lawless manner and come to this country under Joe Biden, You had 8.2 million illegal immigrants that crossed that southern border while he was president. That is larger than the population of 32 U.S. states. That is not sustainable. That was that way. It was absolutely a foreign invasion that had happened in our country. Well, what do you say to, like, the Charlottesville Police Chief, who all of a sudden takes all of the flock camera data and secures it so other law enforcement can't, and only Charlottesville Police can act.

access it so that nobody winds up, you know, no illegal winds up getting caught in Charlottesville on a surveillance camera that they all, you know, agreed was perfectly fine for us and wasn't going to be a problem. I think it shows misplaced priorities and horrible judgment. Your first job as a public servant is to make sure your citizens are safe. That does not, the actions you described did not make your citizens any safer and makes them less safe. True. And when you decide that you're not going to cooperate federal authorities, for particularly those that are violent offenders that are here illegally,

that commit another crime, you're making your citizens less safe. And so the idea that they are less concerned about their citizen safety than those that have broken the law by coming here illegally, I think says a lot more about them and their misplaced priorities. Jason Miaris on with us. I've got two last ones for you. of them's campaign-related, and we'll finish with that. And I also want to see if we have an update on the Loudoun school situation. I mean, can this school division just be more of a mess, you know, or is this the best

thing that could happen leading into another gubernatorial election? Well, tragically, you know, when we ran in 2021, our theme was Parents Matter, and Virginia kind of became the epicenter of the parents matter movement, because so many parents are told either through their school principals or told through their school boards to sit down, be quiet, and you shouldn't have a voice. And that was never our attitude here. We have fought for parents' rights. One of our first lawsuit in Virginia that we had to litigate, and one was simply this idea that parents could decide whether their child has to wear a mask in school, not an unelected bureaucracy. And we had to fight that all the way through the court system to be able to win that. So we are proud of our work on the

Parents Matter movement. We're proud to stand with parents. and the fight is never ending. And campaign-related, where are you going to be next? Because you've got to split the time, lean on some of your assistant AGs in the office, I guess. And I know a few of them, they're capable. But where are you going to be campaign-wise? Because I know the press loves to talk about this fundraising gap. I imagine that's now that the ticket is full on into the summer.

You and Winsom and John, where are you guys going to be? where can people visit with you? Yeah, well, what we're going to be a variety of different events. I know July 4th, I get the joy of being able to stand in front of a group of new Americans that are taking that oath of allegiance at Fort Monroe. I get to tell them, welcome home. Amen. It's always an incredibly moment of patriotism when these individuals that have come from all over the world for the chance to be in Americans. And let me tell you, they have such deep love and appreciation for what this country is. And then we get to go marching some parades and celebrating the

States. So we were going to be out really active. Virginia is a beautiful state, but it is a big state. So we're going to be at every corner. We look forward to being on the campaign trail. Well, we'd love to have you stop by and visit us. Happy Birthday America here in Stanton, if you have time. But you'll wear out the tire rubber, Jason. And thank you for visiting with us. And thank you for the last three and a half years of being our attorney general and looking forward to the next bunch. Thank you, Joe. We'll see on the trail ahead. That'll do it for today's show. Don't forget to hit that subscribe button,

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