John Washington III Questions School Bus Safety or Government Entrapment, and Pledges Federal Investigations

John Washington III raised serious concerns about reports and allegations involving old, inactive school buses allegedly being used to catch drivers passing when their stop signs are activated. "School bus laws were created to protect our children, NOT to create another revenue stream for city and state governments!" John Washington III wrote.

John Washington III said 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 between protecting children and deliberately setting people up to receive traffic tickets," he wrote. If city governments and police departments are deliberately approving such tactics simply to collect more money from hardworking Americans, he wrote, that is a serious abuse of government authority.

As president, John Washington III said, his administration would not ignore the allegations: he would push for federal investigations, where legally authorized, into cities, states and law enforcement agencies accused of deliberately manufacturing traffic violations for financial gain, and pursue accountability through every lawful avenue available, including federal civil rights enforcement where violations of federal law are established. If an inactive school bus is being used primarily to generate citations rather than protect children, he 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 government works for the people. The people do not exist to fund the government through deceptive enforcement practices!" John Washington III wrote.