A man who raped a 10-year-old child repeatedly is now back in his native Laos — no thanks to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who had pardoned the man who had a removal order due to his criminal history.
It took intervention from Secretary of State Marco Rubio to get the man’s legal status revoked after the pardon.
But the biggest paper in Minnesota, the Minnesota Star Tribune, is hailing Gov. Walz’s decision. Their reason to allow a child rapist to walk the streets of Minnesota when it could be deported? The events of Jan. 6, 2021, of course.
One does have to applaud the folks at the Star Tribune for ingenuity, if here unleashed in a manner that is profoundly sick. Tou Lue Vang, the man in question, told investigators he raped the girl in question because in his society, this was considered normal. In fact, he told police this was “a mistake,” but “a minor thing,” and he didn’t mean the victim’s age. Apparently, child rape was little more severe than a fender-bender in his mind.
The fact that he didn’t receive a removal order until earlier this year should have been an outrage in and of itself, but what happened next was why we’re still discussing this. In the intervening years, the convicted child rapist (who ended up just spending eight months in confinement at a county facility despite receiving a 12-year state prison sentence initially) has built a life in the United States, with children of his own.
This was effectively the reason behind the decision to pardon him, which received a 4-2 vote from the Minnesota Clemency Review Commission and a unanimous decision to pardon from Walz, Democrat state Attorney General Keith Ellison, and state Supreme Court Chief Justice Natalie Hudson, a Walz appointee.
“The victim supports this pardon. His [Vang’s] wife stayed and has forgiven. He also [has] immigration concerns. He has remorse and was discharged from probation,” said the head of the Minnesota Clemency Review Commission in her decision.
Hellbound and Down 