Assemblywoman Pilar Schiavo, D-Chatsworth, and the California Democrat Party have once again shown this nation, this state, and more importantly, this community, that they stand for the protection of criminals and sexual predators. This is the cold, hard truth, undeniable with her recent vote in the affirmative on May 1 to keep the crime of purchasing 16- and 17-year-old children for sex, a misdemeanor.
Following this morally abhorrent vote, the California Democratic Party started to run television attack ads on Republicans and the sane Democrats for voting down Assembly Bill 379, which was stripped of the language that would make purchasing a 16- and 17-year-old for sex a felony. The Democrat Party falsely and blatantly accused Republicans of failing to protect minors, when it was literally they who failed in their sacred duty to protect minors from being sex trafficked.
I take no pride in calling someone like Assemblywoman Schiavo and others who voted alongside her an enemy to sanity and common sense, but in this case, it literally makes no sense to vote against a bipartisan bill that would strengthen the penalties for sexual predators. Adding insult to injury, Democrats like state Sen. Scott Weiner attempted to gaslight us into saying that making that heinous crime into a felony is discriminatory to the LGBT community.
Make it make sense to me, how punishing someone who attempts to purchase a minor for sex, by charging them with a felony, is somehow discriminatory to the LGBT community. I do not care if you are gay, straight, or trans. If you attempt to purchase a minor for sex, you deserve a felony charge and much more. People like that have no place in a decent society, period.
But now, because the Democrat Party has been caught dead in their tracks of lies and gaslighting, they have agreed to reconsider the bill with the felony language added back in. Will Assemblywoman Pilar Schiavo do the right thing? I sure hope she does, because having another vote against that on her record is not a good thing, and I cannot fathom why any rational Democrat would continue to support a person who does not believe people who purchase minors for sex should be charged with a felony.
I urge anyone and everyone with a voting voice to put the pressure on Assemblywoman Pilar Schiavo to vote to protect minors from sex traffickers. If you truly cared about children, this should be a no-brainer. But if you do not, and Assemblywoman Schiavo fails again in her duty, she must be voted out of office. This is the only way.
Matt Funicello
Saugus
