Jeff Sessions is a lying bigot who should resign

Jefferson Beauregard Sessions, who has been the U.S. Attorney General for only a few weeks, may find himself out of a job at the rate he’s going. But unemployment could be the least of his worries, in light of reports that he lied under oath during his confirmation hearing. Trump’s top law enforcer, who plans to cause so much trouble to black people, Muslims, immigrants and others, now finds himself in his own deep trouble.

The Washington Post broke the news that Sessions spoke twice with Sergei Kislyak, the Russian ambassador to the U.S., in July and September of 2016, during the presidential campaign and when Sessions was a Trump adviser.

During the Jan. 10 confirmation hearing for attorney general, Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) asked Sessions what he would do if he learned someone in the Trump campaign communicated with Russian government officials during the campaign. “I’m not aware of any of those activities,” Sessions said, adding, “I have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign and I did not have communications with the Russians.”

Following the breaking news, Democrats seized the opportunity to speak out against a man they did not believe should have been attorney general in the first place.

Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, urged Sessions to resign from his post. “When Senator Sessions testified under oath that ‘I did not have communications with the Russians,’ his statement was demonstrably false, yet he let it stand for weeks – and he continued to let it stand even as he watched the President tell the entire nation he didn’t know anything about anyone advising his campaign talking to the Russians,” Cummings said in a statement.

“Attorney General Sessions should resign immediately, and there is no longer any question that we need a truly independent commission to investigate this issue,” Cummings added.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) also called for Sessions to resign:

Meanwhile, if Sessions does resign — also facing possible perjury charges — the timing could not be better. It was well-known that the man was a civil rights nightmare with a long history of hostility to black people, affiliation with anti-immigration hate groups, and support for the Confederate cause.

In his new position heading the U.S. Department of Justice, Sessions has plans to crack down on state marijuana legalization. Under his watch, the government has retreated from the Texas voter ID case. And Sessions announced that his department will “pull back” from civil rights suits against police departments and no longer monitor troubled law enforcement agencies, focusing instead on violent crime and police morale.

Further, let’s not forget, as Joy Reid reminds us, that Sessions brought other sketchy and unsavory individuals to the Trump White House.

Now, Sessions is one of a number of ethically challenged Trump advisers and cabinet members, making us wonder where all this is headed:

Don’t look to the Justice Department for help if you’re black, because if you do, you’ll find yourself in trouble. But now, Jeff Sessions is the one in trouble. He is not fit to lead the Justice Department and prosecute people for crimes they may have committed, when he has been caught in a lie, in what appears to be a federal crime.

As attorney general, Jeff Sessions was going to put a lot of black people in prison — private prisons — to crack down on a rise in crime that exists only in the minds of those in the Trump administration. Now the man must resign, and if he’s lucky, he won’t find himself in jail.

Follow David A. Love on Twitter at @davidalove.