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Ted Cruz criticizes candidates for sending male rapist to women’s prison

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“I would say the entire justice system is absurd”

By Jon BrownChristian Post Reporter
U.S. Judge Sarah Netburn defended her August 3, 2022, recommendation to place a male serial rapist in a women's prison during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on May 22, 2024.
U.S. Judge Sarah Netburn defended her August 3, 2022, recommendation to place a male serial rapist in a women’s prison during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on May 22, 2024. | Senate Judiciary Committee

Republican Senator Ted Cruz of Texas on Wednesday sharply criticized Biden’s recommendation to place a man who identifies as transgender in a women’s prison even though he pleaded guilty to child pornography and rape.

During her back-and-forth with Cruz at a contentious Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, U.S. Judge Sarah Netburn defended her August 3, 2022, recommendation that William McClain, who identifies as a woman and has taken the name July Justine Shelby, should be allowed to live with female inmates in a federal prison for medical reasons.

Netburn, who was nominated by President Joe Biden to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, claimed in response to questions about the case from both Cruz and Sen. John Kennedy (R-Louisiana) that she had “reviewed the facts presented to her and made a decision,” adding that inmates have the right to “be safe in their environment.”

McClain was incarcerated at the Federal Correctional Institution in Otisville, New York, after being found guilty of molesting a nine-year-old boy and raping a 17-year-old girl, as well as distributing violent child pornography, Cruz noted.

Cruz, who pointed out that McClain is 6 feet 2 inches tall and has male genitalia, asked Netburn why she found it acceptable for the confessed serial rapist and child pornographer to be incarcerated with women.

“A minute ago, you said that when this man decided he was a woman, you said this person was, quote – I wrote it down – ‘sober and entirely female,'” Cruz said. “That sentence struck me as remarkable. Did this person have male genitalia?”

“Excuse me, I meant to say that hormonally he is a woman,” Netburn replied, before admitting that McClain has all the characteristics of a man.

“So you took a 6-foot-2 serial rapist, a serial child molester with male genitalia, and he said, ‘You know, I’d like to be in a women’s prison.’ And your response was, ‘That sounds great to me,'” Cruz said.

“Let me ask you something: Do the other women in this prison have any rights?” Cruz asked.

Cruz claimed that the idea that a baby is “assigned a gender” at birth “would astonish many Americans.” He also joked that Netburn is a graduate of Brown University and that her apparent belief “sounds like something from a college teacher’s lounge and has nothing to do with reality.”

Cruz summed up Netburn’s ruling as evidence that she did not care about the women who might be at risk if they were housed with a male serial rapist.

Netburn insisted on her repeated response that she had decided based on the facts presented to her, prompting Cruz to claim that she was “a radical” who “had no place in the judicial profession.”

“I have to say, if I were the father of one of these women and you decided that my daughter’s cellmate should be a 6’2″ man who commits brutal sexual assaults over and over again, I would say the entire legal system is absurd. And it’s clear from your record that your political ideology matters far more than the rights of these women you have endangered.”

Cruz joined Kennedy, who had previously questioned Netburn during the McClain hearing.

“Miss Shelby said, ‘I don’t want to go to a men’s prison, I want to go to a women’s prison,'” Kennedy said. “And the Bureau of Prisons said, ‘What planet did you fly in from? You’re going to a men’s prison with that criminal record?’ And you sent him to a women’s prison, didn’t you? You said the Bureau of Prisons was trying to violate the constitutional right of Ms. Shelby – the former Mr. McClain – didn’t you?”

Kennedy said that despite her claims that she was not a political activist, her legal record proved otherwise.

Footage of the exchange between Netburn and Cruz, tweeted by swimmer Riley Gaines, had garnered tens of millions of views by Thursday.

Jon Brown is a reporter at The Christian Post. Send news tips to [email protected]

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