Virginia State Senator Lillie Louise Lucas, a Democrat, was indicted Thursday in connection with a criminal drug trafficking and money laundering scheme. She was elected to Virginia’s Senate in 1991 and has served as the president pro tempore since 2020.
Lucas, along with six other defendants, now face charges such as drug trafficking, money laundering, fraud, and firearms charges. According to the Department of Justice, the Virginia senator led an operation made up of close associates and family members, where she “allegedly approved and directed activities of the enterprise, including arranging for the acquisition and distribution of 100 kilograms or more of marijuana and supervising the laundering of marijuana proceeds.”
“Louise Lucas has served in a position of public trust in the Commonwealth of Virginia for over three decades,” Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a statement. “The charges alleged in this indictment reveal the behavior of a public servant who put her own financial interests before the people she was elected to serve. Our federal prosecutors will continue to be guided by the facts and evidence that led a grand jury to indict Ms. Lucas and her alleged co-conspirators.”
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Lucas responded to the indictment in a statement on X. “Today, the FBI, the Department of Justice, and the full weight of the federal government have been wielded against an 82-year-old great-grandmother.”
She said that she “grew up under Jim Crow” and has “seen what happens when people in power try to silence those who stand up to them.”
“I spent my life fighting back, and I’m not stopping now,” Lucas continued. “I’m not new to this. I’m true to this. I will not be intimidated. I will not be bullied. And I will not back down.”
This article originally appeared on American Faith and is reposted with permission.
