WASHINGTON–It appears House Minority Leader [crscore]Nancy Pelosi[/crscore] isn’t going to miss embattled San Francisco Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi.
Mirkarimi, who was crushed in a local sheriff’s race last Tuesday night by now former deputy Sheriff Vicki Hennessy, found himself in the middle of a controversy this past summer after 32-year-old Kate Steinle was gunned down by an illegal immigrant by the city’s Pier 14.
Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez was deported five times before the incident but was released from jail by local authorities even though federal officials requested to be notified of his release.
Mirkarimi defended his actions regarding Lopez as following the city’s sanctuary policy, but he found himself abandoned as San Francisco’s mayor while other Democrats distanced themselves from him. Hennessy campaigned on easing up on the “gag order” of the policy while examining each case to see if it qualifies for federal notification.
Pelosi looked at Hennessy’s win as a “victory” and that the incoming sheriff is “popular in the community,” telling The Daily Caller at her weekly presser, “In [Hennessy’s] statements about [sanctuary city policy], she said she would view these issues about turning over people on a case by case basis. She had disagreed, as most of us did, with what the current sheriff did, but I wouldn’t, in friendship, think that it was a bad night for Democrats because Vicki Hennessy won in San Francisco.”
She added,” We’re all very proud of her. It was a great victory and her distinction that she made is that you look at each case one at a time. I’m pleased that the Senate has rejected some of the ill-conceived notions that were drifting around there about sanctuary cities.”
Mirkarimi had other troubles following him through election day, which included bruising his wife’s arm in a 2011 New Year’s Eve argument. He pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor false imprisonment charge in March 2012 and was later placed on three-year probation.
In November 2014, Mirkarimi was in trouble for messing up a search for a San Francisco General Hospital patient. Her body was found in a stairwell weeks after she wandered from her hospital room. Mayor Ed Lee and others, reports Fox News, pushed Hennessy to run as a result of Mirkarimi’s problems.