Sarah Huckabee seems to always have that cheerful smile. Even while she’s being awful, which is most of the time, there’s that ever-present smile. This time around, she’s being more evil than usual — she wants to put more of her constituents in jail, according to Queerty. The Arkansas governor is currently brawling with the state’s Board of Corrections because she wants to add 622 beds to the state’s prisons. The board only okayed 130 beds due to concerns over safety and staffing.

But Sanders, couldn’t even be bothered to pardon a man who’d spent more than 32 years in state prison for a murder he almost certainly didn’t commit. Since this was right before Thanksgiving, she did, however, find the time to pardon a turkey. Because that’s how this woman is. She’s nastiness in a nutshell and a tablecloth dress.

Giving clemency to Charlie Vaughn would be a great way for @SarahHuckabee to mark the #Thanksgiving holiday. It would also be the Christian thing to do.#Arkansas #arpx https://t.co/NO9bI9vwxE

— Rich Shumate (@The_Shumater) November 18, 2023

I don’t see how Sanders can be this cruel, to let an innocent man continue to rot in jail after literally decades. This is the kind of person she is, however. I don’t think there’s a kind bone anywhere in her body.

Her administration has announced plans to go full steam ahead with the prison expansion, thus usurping the Board of Corrections’ authority, and that’s when the legal fun began. Perhaps this is a grudge match, because last month, the board suspended Corrections Secretary Joe Profiri, whom Sanders appointed. But the board listed Profiri’s lack of urgency in dealing with prison as one of its grievances against him.

Prisons in the state are filled to overflowing, with more than 16,440 inmates, well beyond the capacity of 15,022 according to The Associated Press.

What’s worse is that this number is expected to grow.

The Protect Arkansas Act, which went into effect January 1 is almost certain to worsen this tragic situation because it lessens and in some cases even eliminates parole eligibility for many felonies. That is guaranteed to put more bodies in prison beds. After Profiri was suspended, the Board of Corrections sued Arkansas over recently enacted laws that relinquish oversight of the secretary. The two edicts transfer powers from the board to Profiri, Queerty reports, and place him directly under the governor’s authority.

How convenient. But last week, a county judge ruled in favor of the board, and not long after its members reasserted their authority and fired Profiri Wednesday by a 5-2 vote. Good for them! The board is worried about the safety of prisoners and prison officials alike. Sanders doesn’t give a flying f*ck about that. She has said she will keep Profiri as a senior advisor in her office. Attorney General Tim Griffin is currently suing all seven members of the board as well.

But as bad as all this sounds, it’s actually even worse, and according to the Arkansas Advocate, just before former Governor Asa Hutchinson’s term ended in 2022, his administration set in motions plans that would have resulted in the construction of a new 1,000-bed penitentiary and a separate 300-bed community corrections facility. But once she was in office, Sanders put those plans on hold to work with her new corrections secretary to formulate their own strategy.

As the spring sessions began, Sanders pushed the PROTECT Act, a law that restricted sentencing and parole laws in the state, and this will inevitably lead to more incarceration and longer prison terms. She has also called for setting aside $470 million to build 3,000 new prison beds.

As Queerty notes:

“While the details may be a bit dizzying, here’s the bottom line: Sanders is fighting her state’s Board of Corrections for not being draconian enough when it comes to throwing people in jail.”

And let me tell you, under Sanders, Arkansas is a real mess.

The state has the fifth-highest incarceration rate in the country, at a per capita rate of 942 per 100,000 people. That is greater than every democracy in the world, including the U.S. Sanders wants to go for broke however, she’s aiming higher, even throwing a college student in jail for 10 days simply for chanting “Trans lives matter.”

Her fellow Arkansas Republican, Sen. Tom Cotton is just as bad, and at one point he introduced a bill that requires the federal Bureau of Prisons to house inmates according to their sex assigned at birth, not their gender identity. Fortunately, that bill went nowhere but there is so much these two could be working on. Because while the state’s prisons are filled to the rafters, Arkansas still ranks 47th in crime (out of a possible 50), which means that further overstuffing beds in an already beyond-stressed prison complex is perhaps a bad idea.

But Sanders is doubling down, no matter what. If there’s one thing Arkansans can bet on, it’s that Sanders will enact even nastier policies as governor.

Perhaps this funny “Sarah Huckabee Sanders” (Maggie Reed) puts it best.

One year later with “Govenor” #SarahHuckabeeSanders pic.twitter.com/D6aLD0FUzM

— Maggie Reed (@mermaidmamamags) January 11, 2024