Joe Biden wants to have it both ways on crime and policing
Joe Biden wants to rewrite history.
Just recently, the president traveled to Wilkes-Barre, Pa., and gave a speech trying to convince voters that – suddenly, magically, overnight – he’s become very, very concerned about crime. That he and his Democratic colleagues are pro-police, despite what you might have heard and seen over the past several years.
Biden unveiled his “Safer America Plan,” hoping voters will forget Democrats’ many policies that have made America distinctly unsafe. Looking at data from 23 cities, homicides for the first half of 2022 jumped 39 percent from the same time in 2019, before the George Floyd protests changed everything. Robberies were 19 percent higher.
Biden’s sudden “super cop” persona is utter hogwash. It is a fiction driven by Democrats’ very real concern that they are being blamed for the crime spike horrifying much of the nation.
Polling shows crime to be one of voters’ top concerns this year, and Biden’s approval rating on the issue is one of his worst. According to a recent CBS poll, some 58 percent of Americans disapprove of his handling of the issue, while 42 percent approve. More importantly, 92 percent of respondents said that crime would be either very (67 percent) or somewhat (25 percent) important to how they will vote in the upcoming midterm elections.
Is it any wonder that Biden gets low marks on crime? This is the president who has said there is “absolutely” systemic racism in law enforcement and who ran for president promising to “Expand and use the power of the U.S. Justice Department to address systemic misconduct in police departments and prosecutors’ offices.”
Biden also ran for the Oval Office promising to “end cash bail,” an approach that is causing crime to soar in Democrat-led cities, where even violent offenders are released back onto the streets to commit more crimes.
Just recently in New York, an ex-con who sucker-punched and nearly killed a complete stranger was initially released without bail after his charges were downgraded to misdemeanors, despite the vicious attack being recorded on film and available to prosecutors. Thankfully, he eventually ended up behind bars.
Every day such offenses are reported, as average citizens wonder what has happened to common sense, and why they no longer feel safe.
It isn’t just homicides that are out of control. Voters are appalled by images of criminals sauntering out of stores carrying armloads of expensive items, while security guards stand idly by, afraid of being prosecuted by district attorneys more concerned about the rights of criminals than of victims.
Shoppers find everyday items in their local CVS stores under lock and key, put there by managers frustrated by the insolent crowd causally ransacking the shelves while calls to local law enforcement prove futile. Cops fear getting involved, especially since most of those arrested will be released within hours.
This slide into lawlessness took root during the summer of 2020, after the murder of George Floyd. Unruly crowds burned down buildings, looted stores and attacked cops in cities like Minneapolis and Seattle and mostly went unpunished. Democratic lawmakers and media types excused the violence that killed innocent bystanders and cost tens of billions of dollars in damages, refusing to step in and denounce the criminals taking advantage of the situation.
Biden, running for president, proposed restrictions on cops that would make their job harder. While mildly denouncing violence, Biden commended those protesting Floyd’s murder, which he described as a “wake-up call for our nation.” But he also said it was unacceptable “for our police… to escalate tensions or resort to excessive violence.” In other words, it was mostly the cops who were at fault.
Biden continues to walk that same line today, trying to sound tough on crime even as he appeases progressives who think cops are racist and that even murderers should be given a second, third, or, really, an infinite number of chances at rehabilitation.
But today Biden is president. It is he who has set the permissive tone undermining the country’s security. Look no further than the breakdown of the rule of law at the southern border, where the Biden administration has encouraged an unparalleled surge in illegal immigration into our country.
The president’s hypocrisy is breathtaking. In his speech in Pennsylvania, he denounced the “opioid epidemic” and specifically calls out drugs that have been “laced with fentanyl.” He skips right over the part where cracking down on drug overdoses also means closing the southern border, where most of that deadly drug enters the country. He fails to mention that in his first year as president, fentanyl-related deaths jumped 23 percent and that the deadly drug is now the number one cause of deaths among young people.
Biden wants it both ways. He says he’s “opposed to defunding the police” but also placates his progressive base by insisting that rules eliminating chokeholds and restricting no-knock warrants should be imposed nationwide.
None of what Biden offers will solve rampant crime in cities like New York and Chicago. We need to return to “broken windows” law enforcement, which works. But the president does not dare offend progressives in his party.
Biden closed his speech by confusing who was running for which office in Pennsylvania, a key swing state. Here are his words, from the White House transcript:
“But think about doing me a favor. Please, please elect the attorney general to the Senate [to be governor]. (Applause.) Elect that big ol’ boy to be governor [senator].”
Now do you feel more secure?
Liz Peek is a former partner of major bracket Wall Street firm Wertheim & Company. Follow her on Twitter @lizpeek.