Last week two village radicals in Albemarle County masked up and tried to block Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents from apprehending two illegal immigrants who had been charged with misdemeanors. This post isn’t about the illegals — they’re now being held in the Farmville Detention Center — it’s about the “legals” who interfered with the federal authorities in the conduct of their business.

Watch the woman in the green skirt. “Do you have a warrant for his arrest?” she officiously queried the federal official. Repeatedly.

The incident occurred in the Albemarle County courthouse, and local media were there at the scene. Both The Daily Progress and VPM News covered the story. Apparently, detaining individuals residing illegally in the U.S. who have been charged with crimes is a controversial act worthy of close media scrutiny.

Reports VPM: “In an emailed statement earlier this week, Albemarle Commonwealth’s Attorney Jim Hingeley said that he was “greatly concerned that arrests carried out in this manner could escalate into a violent confrontation, because the person being arrested or bystanders might resist what appears on its face to be an unlawful assault and abduction.”

Hingeley’s spin is noteworthy: he places the onus for the risk of “violent confrontation” not on the protesters laying hands on ICE officials, but the ICE officials themselves for what Hingeley deems to be “an unlawful assault and abduction.”

If Hingeley thinks federal authorities are unlawfully assaulting and abducting illegal aliens, then as a local prosecutor, he should file charges against them. Let this play out in a court of law. It is decidedly not the business of village radicals to pursue vigilante-like tactics to block ICE officials in the conduct of their duties.

According to this Red State post, the protesters appear to be affiliated with the UVA Dissenters student group: “Social media accounts connected to the group apparently posted photos of the agents involved in the arrests and descriptions of their vehicles, down to the license plate numbers.”

Nice.

Maybe someone should do the same to the Dissenters.

Once upon a time, political progressives stood up for the rights of law-abiding DACAs (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) who had grown up in the U.S., become Americanized, and knew little of their homelands. By tugging at peoples’ heartstrings, they could make a decent moral case for these young people.

Today progressives are standing up for criminals.

Sorry, but there are no heartstrings to be plucked. Good luck with that.

— JAB