NARSOL: Sex Offender Laws; and The Federalist Society: Shifting the U.S. Legal Landscape to the Right

NARSOL: Sex Offender Laws

Tayler Boncal was a 22-year-old student teacher and track coach at Conrad High School in West Hartford. She was arrested this past February and charged with three counts of second-degree sexual assault for having a consensual relationship with an 18-year-old student. They young man initiated the relationship and was not a member of the track team. If convicted of sexual assault Ms. Boncal will have too register as a sex offender. Doing so will most likely alter the course of her life.

NARSOL, a nationally recognized non-profit dedicated to restoring the civil and constitutional rights of registered sex offenders, believes that criminal charges in this instance are unwarranted. The group contends that any law that allows an adult to be criminally prosecuted for having a consensual relationship with another adult should be abolished.

Guest – Brenda Jones, has been involved in this cause since September of 2009. She has been executive director of state affiliate FAIR (Families Advocating Intelligent Registries) since its inception in 2010 and in 2012 became the first executive director of NARSOL.

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The Federalist Society: Shifting the U.S. Legal Landscape to the Right

With the recent nomination of conservative attorney Brett Kavanaugh to replace Justice Anthony Kennedy, the United States Supreme Court will have a majority of authoritarian anti-democratic jurists who support a powerful executive. At the same time, Donald Trump has wasted no time in appointing more conservatives to federal judgeships.

More and more we’re hearing that the once little-known Federalist Society is behind these appointments. But it’s now a new development. The Society was formed at Yale University in 1981, and has steadily and quietly been placing its lawyer members in positions of power in the government and judiciary.

In their 2013 book, The Federalist Society: How Conservatives Took the Law Back from Liberals, attorneys Michael Avery and Danielle McLaughlin track the movements of this small group of conservative law students and lawyers and their increasing influence. The Federalist Society has lawyer chapters in every major city in the United States and student chapters in every accredited law school. Members include economic conservatives, social conservatives, Christian conservatives, and libertarians. One of the things that has made the Federalist Society so very effective is their big picture agenda. While they may have differences of opinion on a range of issues, they have successfully put those aside to advance a far-reaching, long-lasting, and broad conservative agenda. Their agenda is chipping away at social gains made since the 1930s. Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security are on the block. So is Roe v. Wage. Citizen United, holding that corporations are persons and money is free speech, and the union-breaking Janus decision are just the beginning. Other attacks on democracy include voter suppression, voter ID laws, and gerrymandering.

Guest – Attorney Michael Avery. Michael is the former president of the National Lawyers Guild, and is an expert in the areas of constitutional law and police misconduct.
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