House Republican Leader Nic Kipke, far left, argues against granting new powers to the attorney general.

Hours after the House of Delegates gave final approval to broad new powers for Attorney General Brian Frosh to sue the federal government, he was in front of a House committee asking for $1 million a year to hire five lawyers for his new mission.

The delegates approved the new powers for the Democratic AG to go after the Trump administration without the permission of Republican Gov. Larry Hogan in a straight party line vote 89-50, with all Republicans opposed.

Republicans on the House Health and Government Operations Committee wondered why the fiscal analysis of the just passed Maryland Defense Act, SJ5, and its House companion, HJ3, stated that “The Office of the Attorney General can use existing resources to handle any litigation initiated as a result of the resolution,” yet here he was asking for a million dollars in mandated spending in HB913.

The mandated spending would not kick in until the fiscal 2019 budget begins July 1, 2018. For the next 16 months, Frosh would be using existing attorneys in his main office, but they would be pulled from other duties, he said.

The new spending mandate was sponsored by Del. Sandy Rosenberg, D-Baltimore, who also was the lead sponsor of the House joint resolution. The bill contains the same language as the resolutions authorizing the attorney general to pursue lawsuits.

The bill and the resolution explicitly mention “ensuring the availability of affordable health care; safeguarding public safety and security; protecting civil liberties; and preserving and enhancing the economic security of workers and retirees” along with protection of consumer rights, pensions, the environment and “the general health and well-being of [state] residents.”

A key difference between what the House passed Wednesday morning and the bill in committee is the joint resolutions go into effect immediately without the signature of the governor and HB913 is regular legislation that needs the governor’s OK.

“We’re opposed to mandated spending,” said Hogan communication director Doug Mayer, who refused to speculate about whether the governor would veto the bill. Hogan has consistently pushed legislation to reduce spending mandates, not increase them, since they control over 80% of the discretionary general fund budget.

Asked how they arrived at a figure of $1 million for five new assistant attorneys general and support staff, Rosenberg and Frosh said the model was a federalism division in the office of the Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, a Republican.

Pruitt has been nominated as head of the Environmental Protection Agency, an agency he has sued 14 times.

Frosh said he might wind up suing Pruitt if he tries to dismantle the Chesapeake Bay clean-up, an EPA program that was the subject of a Pruitt lawsuit.

Maryland Attorney General misconduct in Maryland is terrifying:

However, Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh did not disclose to the Maryland general assembly that, his office has been violating Federal laws willfully in Maryland for many years by colluding with the corrupt state and union officials operating in Maryland to the detriment of many. The office is also involved in tortious interference of lawyers hired by employees in conspiracy with the Maryland State Education Association (MSEA), ACE-AFSCME Local 2250, AFSCME International and others in the Maryland Democratic party regime.

Other violations by the Office of the Maryland Office of the Attorney General include engagement in Fraud, discrimination and misconduct by interfering with the Maryland court system in retaliation and defamation.

Unconstitutional and illegal. 

The extra powers the attorney General for Maryland has gotten are unconstitutional and only meant to serve close friends and well connected few.  His agenda has nothing to do with protecting illegal immigrants or Chesapeake Bay clean up etc as he and others wants people to believe. The willful violations of State and Federal laws the Maryland State attorney general has been committing is terrifying. We all should be upset after discovering the truth. We need to demand investigations and also call elected officials to conduct a hearing concerning these issues. Interference of state courts in an organized scheme to benefit a few close friends and family should be made a crime in Maryland.  (See Supreme Court Case No. 16A662; Mua v. The Maryland Office of the Attorney General et al; Mua et al v. State of Maryland et al  16-1435; Prince George’s County Circuit Court case No. 11-36992)

Prevalence of Prosecutorial Misconduct

According to legal News, Prosecutorial misconduct is, in the words of noted Harvard Law School professor Alan Dershowitz, “rampant.” Due to the lack of a uniform reporting body – each state has its own attorney discipline system – the number of criminal cases affected by prosecutorial abuses is unknown. Research studies have shed some light on this subject, though.

A 2003 report by the Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit government watchdog group, examined more than 11,400 allegations of prosecutorial misconduct in appellate rulings between 1970 and 2003. In 2,012 of those cases (17.6%), misconduct by prosecutors led to dismissals, sentence reductions or reversals. Few prosecutors, however, were sanctioned for the violations cited by the appellate courts; only 44 faced disciplinary action, and seven of those cases were dismissed.

As stated earlier this week, It is utterly depressing to have to accept the fact that so many legislators in Maryland voted to give more power to the Attorney General who is engaged in misconduct, if only by proxy, colluding in their own subjugation, but to understand why it has happened is incredibly important.

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The prosecutor has more control over life, liberty, and reputation than any other person in America. His discretion is tremendous…. While the prosecutor at his best is one of the most beneficent forces in our society, when he acts from malice or other base motives, he is one of the worst. 

—Former U.S. Attorney General Robert Jackson

Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh

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