Pence courts police while telling them about Biden's calling them 'the enemy'

Washington Examiner:

Vice President Mike Pence told a gathering of Philadelphia police officers that Joe Biden views them as the “enemy,” warning the presumptive Democratic nominee would gut funding for local law enforcement and jeopardize public safety.

Pence delivered the aggressive speech to an indoor gathering of approximately 300 police officers and family members at a Fraternal Order of Police lodge in Philadelphia at the tail end of a bus tour campaign swing through Pennsylvania on Thursday. President Trump trails Biden in this critical swing state in public opinion polls, and Pence presented the choice before voters in November as one between order and chaos.

“Minneapolis, as reported, has begun dismantling their police department. New York City’s mayor, [Bill] de Blasio, has actually cut the NYPD’s budget by about $1 billion,” Pence said. “And, I heard that just yesterday, Joe Biden said that well-armed police, in his words, ‘become the enemy.' And he said that he would 'absolutely, cut funding for law enforcement.'”

Biden, who previously announced his opposition to the blanket defunding of police departments advocated by some liberals, has never described the police as being “the enemy.”

But Republicans are attacking the former vice president for saying in recent comments that the police “have become” the enemy in the eyes of some Americans because of certain law enforcement tactics and use of military-style weapons.

“Surplus military equipment for law enforcement? They don’t need that,” Biden said. “They have become the enemy. They’re supposed to be protecting these people.”

...

The vice president also talked privately with the surviving family members of James “Jimmy” O’Connor, a Philadelphia police officer who was killed in the line of duty earlier this year, as well as officers who were shot and wounded during an hourslong standoff in August of last year.

In public remarks that followed, Pence vowed that he and Trump would stand with the police in the wake of criticism emanating from the death of George Floyd, a black man who died in late May after a white Minneapolis police officer knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes.

“I want you to hear this directly from me: Under this president and this administration, we’re not going to defund the police,” he added, referring to calls from some on the Left to slash taxpayer funding for law enforcement. “We will join with you to stand against the rioters and the looters and the anarchists who would pull down our statues and try and destroy our communities."

...

I think police should be wary of a Democrats siding with criminals who want to defend them and make their job tougher than it already is.  Defunding is already leading to increased crime in areas where it has been adopted like New York City and Minneapolis.

Systematic liberalism is the biggest threat to law enforcement in this country.