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The FBI raided the offices of Virginia Senate President Pro-Tem L. Louise Lucas this week, and within hours the usual suspects were already framing it as another example of the Trump administration targeting political enemies. Virginia Attorney General Jay Jones called it part of a pattern of “failed prosecutions” against Trump’s “stated political enemies.” House Speaker Don Scott Jr. fumed about “theatrics and speculation” while pointing fingers at the White House. Senator Lucas herself claimed the raid was about “power and who is allowed to act on behalf of the people.”
There’s just one problem with this narrative. The investigation into Lucas didn’t start last week. It didn’t start last month. According to multiple federal sources who spoke to the Associated Press, New York Times, and other outlets, this probe began during Joe Biden’s administration. That’s right, the same Biden administration that Democrats spent years defending as above reproach, the same DOJ they insisted was independent and apolitical.
The 81-year-old Lucas, a three-decade fixture in Virginia politics, saw her Portsmouth office and cannabis dispensary raided as part of what officials describe as a “financial” investigation involving potential “corruption and bribery” concerns. The timing is certainly notable, coming after Virginia voters approved Lucas’s redistricting bid, but the timeline doesn’t fit the convenient persecution complex Democrats are trying to sell.
Representative Bobby Scott, who has represented Lucas’s area for 33 years, slammed Trump for what he called “repeated abuse of the Department of Justice to target his perceived political opponents.” But if the investigation started under Biden, who exactly is abusing the DOJ here? Senate Majority Leader Scott Surovell claimed Trump has “obliterated” the Justice Department’s independence, yet the very investigation he’s decrying predates Trump’s current term.
This is the game Democrats play. When investigations target Republicans, it’s justice. When investigations target Democrats, it’s persecution. When the Biden DOJ pursues Trump allies, it’s the rule of law. When that same DOJ’s investigations continue under Trump, it’s suddenly a weaponized police state. The hypocrisy would be breathtaking if it weren’t so predictable.
Lucas has not been charged with any crime, and like all Americans, she deserves due process and the presumption of innocence. But the rush to turn a Biden-era investigation into evidence of Trumpian overreach reveals far more about Democratic desperation than it does about any abuse of power. Sometimes a corruption investigation is just a corruption investigation, regardless of which administration’s FBI agents are carrying it out.
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