Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke Jr., who often compares Black Lives Matter with ISIS, has withdrawn his candidacy for a position with the Homeland Security Department, The New York Times reports.
“Sheriff Clarke is 100 percent committed to the success of President Trump, and believes his skills could be better utilized to promote the president’s agenda in a more aggressive role,” said the sheriff’s adviser, Craig Peterson, in a statement.
Peterson added that Clarke informed Homeland Security Sec. John Kelly of his decision last Friday.
Officials hadn’t divulged what Clarke’s role would have been at the department. He announced previously that he would work as a liaison to state, local and tribal law enforcement agencies in the department’s Office of Partnership and Engagement.
However, Clarke’s announcement was never confirmed by the department, and reports allege that he created a position for himself out of thin air.
Spokeswoman Jenny Burke said the position Clarke mentioned requires secretarial appointment. “No such announcement with regard to the Office of Partnership and Engagement has been made,” she stated, according to The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
Clarke met recently with President Donald Trump to discuss how he could help the president implement his law-and-order agenda, according to Peterson’s statement.
The sheriff has been a vocal critic of the Black Lives Matter movement. In an opinion piece in The Hill, Clarke wrote, “Black Lives Matter organizers hold the same values of America’s age-old enemies, who have always fought the ideals of our Constitution and our nation.” He also listed BLM with ISIS (and Occupy Wall Street) as forces that seek to “take down the West.”
As Clarke looks for ways to aid Trump, there are serious questions about how well he manages his own department in Milwaukee.
A grand jury recommended criminal charges for employees at the Milwaukee County jail in the death of Black inmate Terrill Thomas, who died of dehydration after being denied water for several days. And earlier this month, a jury awarded $6.7 million to a former female inmate at the jail who said a staff member raped her at least five times while she was incarcerated, reports NewsOne.com.
