Highest Law in the Land: How the Unchecked Power of Sheriffs Threatens Democracy [Hardback]

A leading authority on sheriffs in America investigates the impunity with which sheriffs act in policing their communities and the troubling role they play in American life, law enforcement and, increasingly, national politics.

"A leading authority on sheriffs in America investigates the impunity with which sheriffs police their communities, alongside the troubling role they play in American life, law enforcement, and, increasingly, national politics. What should be of grave concern to us all is that sheriffs are wholly unaccountable. They do not report to federal, state, or local executives, and sheriffs' duties are often enshrined in state constitutions, making them effectively "above the law." Sheriffs have become a flashpoint in the current politics of toxic masculinity, guns, white supremacy, and rural resentment. They played a role in the January 6 insurrection-their anti-federal government stance coming into perfect alignment with both far-right militia groups and formerPresident Donald Trump. This rise of the sheriff in national politics and their increasing right-wing radicalization has been assisted by the revival of the so-called Constitutional Sheriff movement, which casts sheriffs as the "last line of defense" between citizens and a libertarian definition of freedom in this country. Such sheriffs have been embraced by white nationalists, the far right, and most factions of the GOP, who seek to attain and maintain power at all costs. More than 95 percent of America's three thousand sheriffs are white men. They employ 25 percent of sworn law enforcement officers. They are the only elected law enforcement, but nearly 60 percent of all sheriffs run unopposed, and because they have no term limits, many serve for decades. They patrol the streets, make traffic stops, execute arrest warrants, and investigate crimes. They run county jails that admit 4.9 million people every year, which puts them in contact with some of the most vulnerable and disenfranchised people in the community. Journalist Jessica Pishko deploys a real gumshoe reporting style and prefers to be in the room to get her story. She's spent hours with the sheriffs she reports on. She's attended far-right rallies where prominent sheriffs blast their rallying cries in order to get a sense of the audiences they're reaching. She has signed up for Constitutional Sheriff training programs to immerse herself in the rhetoric. The result is a ground-shaking revelation about how this militant and unchecked law enforcement contingent sees itself and sees the rest of us"--

Shortlisted for Columbia Journalism School’s J. Anthony Lukas Prize

A Publishers Lunch NonFiction Buzz Book

A leading authority on sheriffs investigates the impunity with which they police their communities, alongside the troubling role they play in American life, law enforcement, and, increasingly, national politics.

The figure of the American sheriff has loomed large in popular imagination, though given the outsize jurisdiction sheriffs have over people’s lives, the office of sheriffs remains a gravely under-examined institution. Locally elected, largely unaccountable, and difficult to remove, the country’s over three thousand sheriffs, mostly white men, wield immense power—making arrests, running county jails, enforcing evictions and immigration laws—with a quarter of all U.S. law enforcement officers reporting to them. In recent years there’s been a revival of “constitutional sheriffs,” who assert that their authority supersedes that of legislatures, courts, and even the president. They’ve protested federal mask and vaccine mandates and gun regulations, railed against police reforms, and, ultimately, declared themselves election police, with many endorsing the “Big Lie” of a stolen presidential election. They are embraced by far-right militia groups, white nationalists, the Claremont Institute, and former president Donald Trump, who sees them as allies in mass deportation and border policing.

How did a group of law enforcement officers decide that they were “above the law?” What are the stakes for local and national politics, and for America as a multi-racial democracy? 
 
Blending investigative reporting, historical research, and political analysis, author Jessica Pishko takes us to the roots of why sheriffs have become a flashpoint in the current politics of toxic masculinity, guns, white supremacy, and rural resentment, and uncovers how sheriffs have effectively evaded accountability since the nation’s founding.

A must-read for fans of Michelle Alexander, Gilbert King, Elizabeth Hinton, and Kathleen Belew.