Liberal policies increasing crime in America
Some people are still arguing that America doesn’t have a crime crisis. The statistics say otherwise. Crime is not only upending the quality of life in Democrat-run cities, but it’s spreading far and wide, showing no sign of subsiding.
In our nation’s capital, all crime categories were up this month, with a 67% increase in robberies, 29% increase in homicides and 112% increase in motor vehicle theft.
On the other side of the country, with 58 homicides as of Sept. 20, Seattle is on pace to see the city’s highest recorded homicides in its history — the existing record is 69 in 1994.
Crime in Austin, Texas, is so bad, with crippling police staff shortages, officials are asking people who have been robbed to dial the nonemergency number 311, instead of 911.
This crime wave started after the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers in 2020. Floyd’s death spurred a criminal justice reform movement that resulted in police defunding, cashless bail, bans on vehicular pursuits and promises by prosecutors not to charge certain violent crimes as felonies.
Rather than walk back clearly unwise decisions, lawmakers and activists have chosen to gaslight the American people. Despite violent crime up 39%, D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson declared “there is not a crime crisis in Washington, D.C.”
In San Francisco, businesses and residents are fleeing, though the ones who remain now lean on private security to do what police officers cannot: patrol their neighborhoods. Yet when pressed to defend left-wing criminal justice reforms, California Gov. Gavin Newsom declared that there is a crime crisis — but in red states.
This is a common and problematic talking point that pretends Republicans are the problem. As one report said, “The murder rate in the 25 states that voted for Donald Trump has exceeded the murder rate in the 25 states that voted for Joe Biden in every year from 2000 to 2020.”
But the data objectively tell the story of a diminishing quality of life in Democrat-run cities — as do the number of people fleeing California. This is why I devoted a section of my new book, “What’s Killing America: Inside the Radical Left’s Tragic Destruction of Our Cities,” to dismantling this particular talking point. What has happened in New York helps to illustrate what’s playing out in many other cities across the country.
Crime crisis? What crime crisis?
When Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg took office, he promised significant reforms in how his office would treat criminals, actually vowing to undercharge and under-incarcerate. This isn’t merely an analysis of what his policies led to; this is explicitly what he promised.
In his first memo to staff, Bragg ordered his DAs to “not seek a carceral sentence” for a number of offenses, including certain robberies, assaults and even gun possession. Additionally, they were instructed to downgrade many felony charges to misdemeanors, including for drug dealing and armed robberies, and never seek sentences over 20 years unless there were “exceptional circumstances” that warrant harsher penalties.
Career criminal William Rolon benefited from Bragg’s new policies. Armed with a knife, he robbed a Duane Reade drugstore of about $2,000 worth of products, such as cold medicine. While brandishing a knife, he told an employee, “(Expletive) you, I’m taking everything.” That same day, he was accused of returning to the store to steal even more.
In line with Bragg’s directives, instead of facing charges for a serious felony for the armed robbery, Rolon was only hit with low-level misdemeanors, including second-degree menacing and petit larceny, as if all he stole was a candy bar. During arraignment, Manhattan Criminal Court Judge Jay Weiner told Rolon that he was “lucky” because this was “a case that two weeks ago would have been charged as a robbery.” He specifically cited the “newly elected district attorney” for being charged with a misdemeanor instead of robbery, a charge he should have earned. “I don’t know if anyone would ever feel lucky standing in front of me in a courtroom, but you might reasonably feel lucky today,” the judge told him. The New York Post reported that at the time of his arrest, Rolon was wanted in Brooklyn after he failed to appear in court on felony assault with a weapon charge. In that original case, he was released to community supervision without bail.
The leaked memo ignited a firestorm of community criticism. The pushback was so significant that after initially defending the memo, Bragg revised some policies, including a promise to prosecute armed robberies. But that was just to quiet the critics. His office mostly stuck to the original directives.
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The "defund the police" movement was one of the most counterproductive responses to crime in history and needs to be reversed immediately. If liberals were honest they would admit it was a mistake and see if they can't encourage more people to join the police departments around America. Voters should hold liberal politicians and accountable for the destruction their policies have imposed on citizens
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