“It’s time that the reign of criminals who are destroying our city . . . come to an end,” San Francisco Mayor London Breed said on Tuesday while she announced new public safety measures.
QUICK FACTS:
- As well-publicized lawlessness overwhelms Californian cities, the state’s leading Democrats suddenly change their policing rhetoric and policies.
- Nonetheless, these officials are careful to avoid offending the social justice crowd or accepting any responsibility for the state of affairs.
CALIFORNIA DEMOCRATS ON URBAN LAWLESSNESS:
- While San Francisco is the crime wave’s epicenter, Mayor Breed is not the only official to reverse course.
- “They’re not just stealing people’s products and impacting their livelihoods, they’re stealing a sense of place and confidence,” Governor Gavin Newsom began. Then he said “I’m not the mayor of California. But I was a mayor. And I know when things like this happen, mayors have to step up.”
- Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, whose congressional district covers San Francisco, chimed in as well. “It’s absolutely outrageous, obviously it cannot continue. There is an attitude of lawlessness in our country that springs from I don’t know where . . . and we cannot have that lawlessness become the norm.”
BACKGROUND:
- San Francisco was among the first American cities to defund its police department.
- The current crime wave is by no means confined to California; other Democratic cities like Portland, Seattle, New York, and Chicago experience similar spikes in both property crimes and violent ones.
- Multiple cities that defunded their departments already reversed course, including Minneapolis, where George Floyd died in police custody.
- This issue not only concerns voters, but also has a strong impact on how they vote. For example, Seattle residents recently elected the city’s first Republican city attorney—who ran on a law and order platform against an “abolish the police” Democrat—in three decades.
- Nationally, President Biden’s job approval rating on crime stands at 36%.
