Philadelphia’s controversial prosecutor, Larry Krasner, is facing congressional scrutiny—as are Northern Virginia local officials—for allegedly obstructing federal immigration enforcement and giving preferential treatment to illegal aliens.
This week, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Calif., sent letters to prosecutors, police, and sheriffs’ offices in Philadelphia and in Arlington County, Virginia, in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. The committee was previously investigating nearby Fairfax County officials.
Prosecutors in all three jurisdictions have received backing from organizations funded by billionaire George Soros.
The House Judiciary Committee letters sought documents of communications about enforcement of the law on noncitizens and how the local agencies worked with—or didn’t work with—Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“Your office also openly gives preferential treatment to aliens based solely on their immigration status, even admitting that ‘low-level and nonviolent crimes should not lead to deportation or necessarily risk one’s immigration status,’” said the letter on Monday to Krasner.
McClintock is the chairman of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement.
“In fact, you created an Immigration Counsel position within your office to evaluate cases involving non-U.S. citizens so that foreign nationals ‘can avoid unnecessary and unjust consequences’—in other words, to shield criminal aliens from deportation,” the letter to Krasner continued.
“You also openly boast about how your policies have resulted in criminal aliens being released onto Philadelphia streets, free to reoffend. Even in cases involving murder or crimes against minors, a prosecutor in your office may still consider a criminal alien’s potential deportation or other immigration consequences in making prosecution decisions,” the letter stated.
Krasner’s office did not respond to phone and email inquiries for this story by publication time. Neither the Philadelphia Sheriff’s Office nor the Philadelphia Police Department responded.
Letters to Arlington County Commonwealth’s Attorney Parisa Dehghani-Tafti, Police Chief Charles Penn, and Sheriff Jose Quiroz all highlighted a case of an illegal alien arrested last month for assault, whose “criminal history includes multiple arrests and charges, including for public intoxication, assault and battery, and probation violations.”
“Under your office’s pro-crime, pro-illegal immigration policies, illegal alien criminals are allowed to freely operate, terrorize local communities, and reoffend without consequences,” the letter from the lawmakers to Dehghani-Tafti said. “Like other sanctuary jurisdictions we have examined, the shielding of criminal aliens from immigration enforcement in Arlington County undermines public safety and thwarts the efficient enforcement of federal law.”
Dehghani-Tafti’s office referred the comment to her personal lawyer, Abbe Lowell.
“Chairman Jordan and House Republicans are once again abusing congressional power to target a Democratic official simply because they disagree with her,” Lowell told the Daily Signal in a statement.
“It’s a politically motivated sideshow to distract people from this Committee’s failure to enforce the law in seeking full disclosure of the Epstein files and Republicans wasting time on Donald Trump’s priorities instead of those actually important to Americans like skyrocketing costs for housing and other living expenses, out-of-control gas prices, and a government that has found a way to make health care even harder to access,” Lowell added.
Arlington County Police Department spokesperson Ashley Savage told the Daily Signal, “Above all else, our driving priority remains the safety of all who live, work, and visit Arlington County.”
Savage added, “On May 13, 2025, the Arlington County Board adopted an update to the Trust Policy, imposing further restrictions on ACPD’s contact with federal immigration enforcement officials. All county agencies are governed by the County Board’s policies, and ACPD’s manual directive was updated to comply with the Trust Policy.”
In January, the House Judiciary Committee sent similar letters to Fairfax County Commonwealth’s Attorney Steve Descano and Sheriff Stacey Kincaid after the murder of Stephanie Minter in the county by alleged killer Abdul Jalloh. The sheriff’s office had refused to honor an ICE detainer on Jalloh, while Descano’s office had dropped most past charges against Jalloh, according to WJLA, the ABC News affiliate in Washington, D.C.
In March, the House committee invited Descano and Kincaid to testify.
Neither Descano’s nor Kincaid’s office responded to phone and email inquiries for this story.
“The policies of these rogue, soft-on-crime prosecutors has been devastating to their communities,” Zach Smith, a senior legal fellow with The Heritage Foundation, told the Daily Signal.
Smith and Heritage colleague Charles Stinson, are co-authors of “Rogue Prosecutors: How Radical Soros Lawyers Are Destroying America’s Communities.”
“And to the extent they have discriminated against defendants based on their citizenship or nationality (ironically, treating non-citizens and even those in the country illegally better than U.S. citizens or those here legally) they have likely violated federal civil rights laws,” Smith continued in an email comment. “This close look at their policies and their impacts is a welcome development.”
