John Washington III Asks Whether School Bus Enforcement Is Safety or Entrapment, and Pledges Federal Investigations as President
Presidential candidate John Washington III is raising concerns about reports that old, inactive school buses are being used to catch drivers who pass with stop signs activated - buses, he says, that no longer carry children. He backs holding drivers who endanger children accountable, he wrote, but he calls enforcement designed to produce tickets an abuse of government authority, and he pledges federal investigations where the law allows.
John Washington III, the 2028 presidential candidate, is raising what he called serious concerns about reports and allegations involving old, inactive school buses allegedly being used to catch drivers passing when their stop signs are activated. The buses in the reports are allegedly no longer being used to transport children, yet are being operated in ways that result in traffic citations, he wrote. School bus laws, he wrote, were created to protect children - “NOT to create another revenue stream for city and state governments.”
John Washington III drew the line his statement stands on. He wrote that he fully supports protecting children, and that any driver who illegally passes a school bus and endangers children should be held accountable. But there is a difference, he wrote, between protecting children and deliberately setting people up to receive traffic tickets - and if city governments and police departments are deliberately approving such tactics simply to collect more money, he wrote, “THAT IS A SERIOUS ABUSE OF GOVERNMENT AUTHORITY!”
His pledge is an enforcement agenda aimed at governments, not drivers. Under his administration, he wrote, the allegations will not be ignored: as President he will push for federal investigations, where legally authorized, into cities, states and law enforcement agencies accused of deliberately manufacturing traffic violations for financial gain, and he will pursue accountability through every lawful avenue available, including federal civil rights enforcement where violations of federal law are established. No city government, police department or state official should be above accountability, he wrote: “THE GOVERNMENT WORKS FOR THE PEOPLE. THE PEOPLE DO NOT EXIST TO FUND THE GOVERNMENT THROUGH DECEPTIVE ENFORCEMENT PRACTICES!”
Where an inactive school bus is being used primarily to generate citations rather than protect children, John Washington III wrote, the public deserves to know who authorized it, why it was authorized, and whether those citations were lawful - and he said stronger safeguards are needed. The statement reports the bus tactics as allegations, and this coverage reports them the same way: no city, department or specific citation is named in his statement, and none is named here. Standards Editor JAX-006 passed this file.
