Peter Burka via Wikimedia Commons

Washington, D.C. – The thin blue line keeping criminals and citizens apart is being stretched to the breaking point as more and more city governments are acceding to progressive demands that local police be “defunded” in the wake of the killing of George Floyd while in the custody of the Minneapolis police.

The movement spawned by the Floyd killing led to demonstrations and riots that paralyzed cities including Louisville, Ky., Seattle, Wash., and Portland, Ore., in the summer of 2020.

In some departments, groups of police officers have quit at the same time, fearing city officials would not back them up in times of crisis. A study featured in The Epoch Times conducted by the Washington-based Police Executive Research Forum found that from April 2020 to April 2021, police “retirements were up 45 percent and resignations rose by 18 percent” over the previous twelve months.

Across the nation, meanwhile, the number of attacks committed on law enforcement officials has increased, taking just six months in 2021 to surpass the total for the previous year.

The national Fraternal Order of Police said Thursday the number of attacks on police officials had already risen 91 percent from 2020, with 150 officers shot and 28 killed already in 2021. Alarmingly, that includes what the FOP said were 50 “ambush-style” attacks, which suggests progressive, anti-police rhetoric has made law enforcement officials targets for political action.

The 2020 Year-End Summary of Law Enforcement Officers Shot in the Line of Duty describes ambush-style attacks as those “carried out with an element of surprise and intended to deprive officers of the ability to defend against the attack.”

The demands that local police departments be “defunded” is clearly, a new Rasmussen Reports poll shows, outside the mainstream of American thinking. “Fewer than one in five voters think America should spend less on police,” the polling firm said, “and a majority want to spend more.”

According to its latest survey, 52 percent of likely U.S. Voters believed America must spend more on police while just 18 percent said less should be spent, which suggests the reality may be starting to hit home. The perception exists that the crime rate is rising and that the Democrats – President Joe Biden in particular – are responsible.

The recently released Washington Post-ABC News poll found only 38 percent of all Americans approved of the Biden Administration’s handling of crime. Nearly half, 48 percent, disapproved.  Politically, the Democrats’ failure to correct that impression could have profound repercussions in the November 2022 congressional elections, a sentiment echoed in a recent opinion piece written by former Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis.

In 1988, Dukakis, the Democratic presidential nominee, blew a lead of as much as 17 points, losing the election to then-GOP Vice President George H.W. Bush, largely because Bush managed to convince voters his Democratic opponent was not only soft on crime but insensitive to its victims.

The tide may be turning, but slowly. The Minneapolis Star-Tribune reported Friday that a Hennepin County, Minnesota judge “has ordered Minneapolis leaders to keep the number of police officers at a level required in the city charter,” in what can only be described as a defeat for progressive activists who successfully pressured the city council and the mayor to cut the department’s funding. In doing so, Judge Jamie Anderson said, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and the City Council “failed to perform an official duty clearly imposed by law.”

While no police officer is above reproach and no police department is perfectly run, the data indicates the police are not the problem. The problem remains the various criminal elements who disrupt every facet of American life, particularly in the inner cities, with their violent, often lethal behavior. Unfortunately, no one has yet hit on a way to successfully defund them.

Peter Roff is a former U.S. News & World Report contributing editor now affiliated with several Washington, D.C. public policy organizations. He appears regularly as a commentator on the One America News network. Reach him by email at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @PeterRoff.




Peter Roff is affiliated with several Washington, D.C. public policy organizations and is a former U.S. News and World Report contributing editor who appears regularly as a commentator on the One America News network. He can be reached by email at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @PeterRoff.

Comments

  1. The push to defund police is fueled entirely by by mis representing arrests of criminals as arrestes of law abiding citizens. What needs to be exposed is the arrest recods and vicitims of the Floyd’s of this false movement. If they are allowed to continue unchallenged to present Floyed as a victim instead of as a criminal then you will not be able to diffuse the false claims driving the defund movement. Floyd attracted attention by breaking the law first (passing counterfeit money), then a second time by resisting arrest and lastly a third time by disposing of drugs (caught on video) while being arrested. It’s insane that this isn’t challenged by rational people on all sides…

    1. Agree completely! He’s definitely NOT a martyr.

      Also does anyone know if there’s any truth to him, that along with him being a drug king, was he also a porn star?

      1. He had Freemason tattoos on his chest. He nearly killed a pregnant lady (and her unborn baby) and had his thug friends steal from her apartment whilst he held a gun to her stomach. But President Trumps Accountant who is clean never harmed a fly is now having to lawyer up! They are very sick/evil people

    2. Minneapolis has been taken over by the muslims and I think they really wanted to chop the cop’s head off they will probably do that in the future

  2. Stop ✋protecting these politicians that are backing B L M and Antifa let them see what happens to regular citizens and maybe they’ll wake the F up time for a change

  3. ANY AND ALL OF THESE ” HATE AMERICAN COPS AND CALL FOR THERE DEMISE, ” NEED HORSE WHIPPING AS IN THE OLD DAYS, FOR DESTROYING THE GREATEST COUNTRY IN THE UNIVERSE FOR THE ” STINKING PROGRESS LIBTURD MARXIST CRAP!” TEACHING OUR KIDS IN SCHOOL ON THIS IS ANARCHIST ACTS FOR SURE AND NEED DESTROYD NOW!

    1. Not for long ….. he isn’t the President and they are all going to get “ THEIR COMING UPS” ! I pray that every traitor will be executed !

  4. This is starting to look like a distraction, and not a genuine issue. Liberals are adept at stirring up populations with such profound agendas, when they’re really skulking around in the background getting us into wars, or cleaning up on graft and tax hikes. One thing they (liberals) do know is that those cops they pretend to despise will be their guardian angels once their opponents get enough of their shenanigans. They also have a cadre of shyster lawyers who’ll ensure that their clients have the legal latitude to provoke their opponents without receiving their just desserts.

  5. If Floyd would have got into the police vehicle when they tried to put him in nothing would have happened as far as I’m concerned he got what he deserved!

    1. Floyd overdosed on Fentanyl, it’s right in the autopsy, the media lied and the Jury was allowed to be terrified by the Communist BLM and Pantifa people so that they would convict no matter what.

  6. LISTEN UP….THERE Needs t oBe a CRACKDOWN on VIOLENT PROTESTERS. GET RID of the DEMOCRAT GOVERNORS….MAYORS…etc THEY are NOT DOING Their JOB that THEY are PAID to DO. THEY are USELESS. GOOD for NOTHING. From SamuraiQueen. 😄😄😄

    1. Look deeper.. the traitors are all CATHOLIC. CATHOLIC and Demo are now the same. Pelosi, CATHOLIC traitor, Biden, CATHOLIC traitor Cuomo, CATHOLIC traitor deblasio, CATHOLIC traitor and the list goes on.

  7. WE NEED TO GET RID OF ALL THESE IDIOTS CALLING THEMSELVES DEMOCRATS WHEN ACTUALLY THEY ARE COMMUNIST!!! PUBLIC HANGINGS MAY WORK, BUT ANYTHING RIGHT NOW, IMPEACH THE COMMUNIST REGIME, STARTING WITH biden AND DOWN!!!
    HE’S KILLING US!!!

    1. One more thing: how is it that EVERY BAD THING that happens, the COMMUNISTS TRY AND BLAME PRESIDENT TRUMP??? The dumb ass psaki LIES right along with her boss!!! HER LIES ARE BECOMING MORE FREQUENT AND WORSE!!! biden/harris communist regime is DESTROYING AMERICA, one CATASTROPHE after another??? I wish these people would STOP LYING, BEING DECEITFUL, AND PUTTING AMERICA AND AMERICANS LAST!!!! The border is a catastrophic failure, you can ONLY BLAME biden, CRIME is out of CONTROL, biden blames gun control, which we ALL KNOW IS BS, INFLATION IS GOING UP, after bidens involvement in rigged elections he wants to federalize the elections, NO FREAKING WAY!!! THIS BRAINLESS LYING COWARD NEEDS TO GET IMPEACHED, AND NOT FOR BOGUS REASONS, LIKE THEY TRIED TO IMPEACH PRESIDENT TRUMP, THERE ARE MANY REAL SITUATIONS THAT COULD BE USED TO IMPEACH THE OLD BAG, biden, & harris should be next!!! If for nothing but the lies told (on camera) there’s soooo many lies told. WE NEED LEADERS TO PUT AMERICA FIRST, because the biden/harris communist regime puts china first!!! IMPRISON hunter, and IMPEACH pedo joe!!!

    2.  the traitors are all CATHOLIC. CATHOLIC and Demo are now the same. Pelosi, CATHOLIC traitor, Biden, CATHOLIC traitor Cuomo, CATHOLIC traitor deblasio, CATHOLIC traitor and the list goes on.

  8. Totally UN-Constitutional and socially jackassed ‘gun control’ is the CAUSE, PROBLEM and REASON for uncontrolled ‘crime’ — and only the dumbest of fools don’t know it !!!

    1. What is the ’cause’. Conquest is best done by an unarmed citizenry. Goebbels 101–Utilize the media to repeat headlines over and over to the masses until the propaganda becomes embedded. People who voice opposition should be publicly exposed, and shunned. Make clear that violence that supports your ideas is welcomed, and violence of opposition will not be tolerated. Use celebrities and entertainment to indoctrinate the youth early, and appeal to those who do not follow the media and their manufactured headlines. Goebbels was CATHOLIC. Vote for ANY CATHOLIC and you destroy the mind of the young.

  9. The communists want to defund and then abolish local law enforcement. Once this is done they will replace local law enforcement with federal cops that will only listen to federal authority. When the federal cops are in place gun confiscation will take place and our freedoms innumerated in the Bill of Rights will be revoked.

  10. Maybe we will be forced to re-start Vigilante Justice in America if they will not protect us!!!! It is hard for the CHEATER criminal Democrat Party Mob leadership to fight criminals in America when their whole criminal radical political party is “one huge crime empire from coast to coast, top to bottom and in Washington D.C., with none of their criminal asses thrown in jail for the crimes they have committed on we, the American people’!!!! They support millions of criminals, just look at our illegal alien problem, they support!!!! The truth will set us all free as the American people!!!!

    1. I don’t believe things will deteriorate to that point. The problem with ‘vigilantes’ is that they won’t allow the Criminal Justice System to verify someone as being the perpetrator of a crime. As Americans, we have that right: To be given a fair trial. The problem these days is that liberals allow very bad people to leave jails, and those miscreants are not going to get religion any time soon.

  11. The party that created the KKK and Jim Crow despotism has also created the anti-capitalist despotism with their Marxist philosophy. FDR called many of the great American businessmen and women economic royalists. FDR was a socialist economic royalist himself using capitalist or free-market economics based on voluntary exchange to acquire wealth and then he uses economic fascism as a tool of government power.

  12. When will these criminals realize just how much valuable equipment is in newsrooms and news Trucks and start making a profit off of them?

  13. The media is the problem, they must be held to account for their lies and nonsense. They are the reason this is being allowed to happen. Bad enough couldn’t happen to the media and the lying sacks of crap that work for it.

  14. Bush was right about Dukakis. When he was Governor the law was if your home was entered you had to leave without confronting the intruder(s). This q=was directly opposed to the doctrine of your home being your castle.

  15. Hidenbiden and his minions have declared war on conservatives and cops. It is time for republicans to grow a set, and do something about this insanity. Or are u going to let these radical,liberals, commies walk all over u like the last 6 months. This senile,frail,old fool,puppet isn’t fit, to be giving any orders/ and making decisions, when he is totally out to lunch. Do something, impeachthis idiot,or throw him out for incompetence.

  16. This Defunding of Our Police issue goes hand in hand with the Second Amendment and gun confiscation !!! The New Radicalized Far Left Demoncrats along with the Deep Dark State Must Render We The People Defenseless in order for them to Unleash Their Evil Socialist Dictatorial Marxist Agenda Upon America !!!
    Wake Up America, We Are In Very, Very Serious and Dire Danger “FROM WITHIN” and From China, O’Biden’s Ally !!!!

  17. All suspects of a crime need to be spanked by our cops like in the 50s, 60s, 70s, and 80s, Less crime when you get spanked and booked. The police have the job now days to spank because the Parents wont spank their darlings

    1. Too many fatherless homes the Dems have created. Too many single mothers who can’t control their own children’s behaviors. Too many hopeless youth who have no adult guidance to raise them in the direction they need in order to become successful contributors to our society.

      Plus the mother’s who do try to guide their own children, like Dr. Ben Carson’s mother did, have the Dems working against allowing them to get their kids out of the failing schools they are forced to remain in, and choosing better schools.

  18. Nazi Terrorist Are The Only Ones Who Want To Destroy The Police Officers , With Out The Police Officers People Would Be Breaking Into your Homes , Abuse In Family’s , Drugs Would Be Out Of Hand , Your Family Would Not Be Safe Or Your Children … The Only Ones Who Want To Do Away With The Police Officers Are The Ones Who Are Doing The Crimes In The USA Of America . The holy Bible Tells Us To Respect The Law Of The Land …. I Pray For The Police Officers And Their Family’s God Bless Each And Everyone Of These Police Officers

  19. One third of America (leftist & socialists) will have to be killed off in a second Civil War. Until that happens – there will be no peace or freedom in this country. It will only get worse from now on. Tell everyone to tell congress to vote NO on any infrastructure spending spree. RINO scum who support infrastructure – you creeps seem to have forgotten the WALL on the southern border. We must dump these dirt bags just like we dumped FOX news.

  20. George Floyd did not deserve to die, but he is not the national hero that Pelosi made of him by presenting a U.S. Flag, flown over the Capitol Bldg. What she did was a direct slap in the face to every law abiding citizen and POSITIVELY a slap in the face of every man and woman who gave their lives for this country on the battlefield! SHAME ON Nancy Pelosi who has been in office for too damn many years!

  21. What do you expect when the DemonicRATS let all violent criminals out of jails? They didn’t let the weak, elderly or mild prisoners out, they let out murderers, rapists and arsonists. That is their sick little Army ! BLM and Antifa are funded by DemonicRATS. These people are evil.

  22. Why do they make floyd into a martyr when he was a drugged up guy passing counterfeit money and was resisting arrest and from what I read about the guy he was a drag on society a worthless piece of crap that never did an honest days work in his life.I know white guy’s who are the same way and I stay far away from them too.

  23. Defund Congress and increase funding for ” REAL JUDGES ” that have exhibited a history of FAIR & Impartial opinions according to the “written law ” & Law enforcement at the local level > .Reduce funding for the FBI & DOJ all of these 3 letter organizations . A little History : the Founding Fathers ” of our Nation were for the most part under age 30 and they did a Great Job ! Why don’t we use that history to fill our Congress /. It couldn’t be any worse !!!

  24. I used to live in minneapolis about 40 years ago and as a white guy I could go into the black community and party with them and never had a problem but since obama was pres.. he brought in all those muslims from bad place’s and now its becoming another chicago

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