Hutchinson deserves a look
Former Arkansas governor Asa Hutchinson’s campaign for the Republican presidential nomination hasn’t gotten much traction, but in some ways, he is an exceptional candidate. Hutchinson has pushed back against the demonization of the FBI by his party’s front-runners and unveiled substantive policy proposals to reform federal law enforcement.
Hutchinson and his ideas deserve to be taken seriously. He ran the Drug Enforcement Administration and oversaw border security under President George W. Bush. He was a U.S. attorney under President Ronald Reagan and sat on the House Judiciary Committee during the 1990s.
The plan he unveiled this month in Washington would require FBI agents to record their interviews, elevate the bureau’s Office of Privacy and Civil Liberties so it’s not underneath the general counsel, transfer drug enforcement responsibilities from the FBI to the DEA to free up resources, and re-assign various administrative support functions from the FBI to the Justice Department.
Hutchinson has called on Donald Trump to drop out of the race amid federal and state indictments, but he also recognizes that these charges have boosted the former president politically, at least in the short term. He decries Trump for politicizing the Justice Department and disparaging law enforcement officers he sees as patriotic and professional. “Trump has done great harm to our rule of law,” he said. “Defunding the FBI is, off the charts, a bad idea.”
The former governor says it’s fair game for a president to set law enforcement priorities and talk with the attorney general about cases bearing national security implications—but that otherwise, it’s essential for any White House to respect the DOJ’s independence.
Hutchinson also calls for establishing a commission on the future of federal law enforcement. He notes that more than 90 federal agencies have the authority to carry firearms and make arrests, from the Postal Service to the National Park Service and even the Agriculture Department (to investigate food stamp fraud). He says the commission could identify efficiencies and reduce turf wars by clarifying who has jurisdiction over what.
None of this is radical, and Democrats could support most of what he’s advocating. Alas, Hutchinson might not get the 40,000 donations necessary to qualify for the first GOP debate next month. If he does, he said he will call out firsttime candidate Vivek Ramaswamy for floating a range of off-the-wall ideas, such as firing more than half the federal workforce and imposing an eight-year term limit on all government employees. Hutchinson has noted that it takes years to train DEA and FBI agents, and it would be ridiculous to push them out after only eight years.
Hutchinson doesn’t always get it right. He applauds FBI Director Christopher A. Wray for fixing problems identified by the Justice Department’s inspector general but then says he’d probably still get rid of him. “I want an FBI director that is fresh,” he said. This is clearly what Republican primary voters clamor to hear, but FBI directors are confirmed to serve a 10-year term to safeguard the bureau’s independence.
Hutchinson, meanwhile, deserves a spot in the GOP primary mix.