Violent crime is a serious problem in our cities. Almost all of them have seen homicides rise since before the pandemic, marking this as one of the most violent eras in American history. As such, it would make a lot of sense to increase funding to the police.
After all, while Democrats love to push gun control as a solution, you still need someone to enforce gun laws, right?
Well, it seems that a lot of Democrats aren’t seeing it that way.
While Cam noted the assault weapon ban bill wasn’t getting a vote on Wednesday, part of the reason why it’s not is kind of telling.
You see, amid a surge in violent crime–one that the progressive wing has used to attack Republicans who oppose gun control–they’re upset over policing.
Infighting among House Democrats on Wednesday threw into disarray plans to pass gun control and police funding bills when the party’s far-left and Black members balked at giving more money to law enforcement.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s team hoped to unite the Democratic Caucus by tying police funding to a ban on military-style “assault rifles” and stripping liability protection from gun manufacturers.
The plan was shattered by the sharp divide between moderate Democrats and the caucus’ liberals and Black members, who demanded more police accountability measures.
“We need to make sure that there are strong accountability provisions and that we are actually ensuring public safety for everyone,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal, Washington Democrat and chairwoman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, told The Washington Times.
…
As the bill package crumbled, Democratic Caucus Chairman Hakeem Jeffries of New York insisted to reporters at the Capitol that accusations that his party supports defunding the police are part of Republicans’ “big lie.”
Clearly, it’s not.
Look, we can’t and won’t agree on gun control. The truth is that access to firearms for law-abiding people is essentially in violent, turbulent times like these. People have a right to protect themselves. That means they have a right to access the tools with which to protect themselves.
That means we have to turn to the police.
Yes, they have no duty to protect us, but by enforcing the laws on the books currently, they can make arrests and get the potentially violent offenders off the streets.
Look at New York City. They went from being one of the most violent major cities in the world to one of the safest. That shift happened because of broken window policing; the strict enforcement of relatively minor laws because those that will break the major ones will jump a subway turnstile in a heartbeat.
In other words, we need police out there, doing their jobs and making arrests for what may seem like minor crimes in an effort to curtail the worst crimes.
And yet, the progressive wing of the Democratic Party would rather take our guns away and the very police they’ll tell us to call instead of acting in self-defense.
I’d ask how that makes sense, but it would be purely rhetorical. We all know that it doesn’t, and that’s why I can’t take their calls for gun control seriously.
Now, as Cam noted in his post, it’s entirely likely the votes simply weren’t there for an assault weapon ban. I’m not going to doubt him on that. Such bans aren’t as popular as some Democrats like to pretend.
Yet the fact that there was a fight over police funding at all would be hilarious if it weren’t so incredibly problematic.