Democrat Jay Jones has found himself in hot water during the final weeks of his campaign to become Virginia’s top law enforcement officer. The closer to Election Day it gets, the scandals seem to keep piling up.
At around the same time he was fantasizing about assassinating Virginia’s former Republican House speaker and wishing death upon his children in 2022, Jones had a truly remarkable run-in with the state’s criminal-justice system. According to recent reports, the Democrat AG candidate is now under investigation for a 2022 reckless driving incident.
By way of background, Jones was clocked going 116 mph in a 70 mph stretch of highway and charged with reckless driving. While other defendants facing the same charge as he faced — with the “same initial hearing date as Jones” — reportedly got jail sentences, Jones got away with a fine and 1,000 hours of community service. (These defendants were even caught driving more slowly than Jones was, according to Cardinal News.)
Supposedly, Jones did that community service in 2023 — 500 hours at “Meet Our Moment” and 500 hours at the Virginia chapter of the NAACP. The first tranche of hours has caused considerable controversy and may be at the heart of the aforementioned criminal investigation.
Meet Our Moment is Jones’ own political action committee, founded to train Democrats to run for office. His hours were certified by an adviser of his, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported. As noted by National Review, social media posts revealed Jones crisscrossed Virginia campaigning for Democrats in 2023, raising questions about whether such activities were counted as part of the 500 hours of “community service” he purportedly conducted with the group.
Perhaps equally interesting, however, is Jones’ “community service” time with the Virginia wing of the NAACP.
In 2023, Jones was a senior associate at the massive law firm known as Hogan Lovells. While there, he was involved in a high-profile lawsuit against the Youngkin administration regarding a dispute over public records pertaining to voting restoration practices for previously convicted felons.
The client Jones and Hogan represented in that case? None other than the Virginia NAACP. (Jones apparently ended work on the case when he started campaigning for state attorney general.)
Much like with Meet Our Moment, it’s unclear how Jones spent his 500 hours with the Virginia NAACP, once again raising questions about whether any of his legal services for the group in its lawsuit against Gov. Glenn Youngkin were counted as “community service.”
These services would seemingly have been provided by Hogan “pro bono,” or for free. But they’re provided for free by the firm’s partnership.
Hellbound and Down 