Democrats, White House Double Down on Bogus Claim That Republicans Wanted to Defund Police
This all comes down to something very simple. Democrats have looked at their internal polls on crime and are panicking.
Last week, I noted that White House press secretary Jen Psaki and Senator Mazie Hirono (D-HI) tried to rewrite history on the defunding of police.
That was a test run for a full-blown attempt to flip the script and shift blame.
Over the weekend, even Chris Wallace of FOX News, who has let his Trump Derangement Syndrome turn him into an advocate for Democrats, tried this tactic:
WATCH: Wallace has contentious interview with GOP lawmaker: Aren't you the ones defunding the police? https://t.co/HO2fwc1Mwa pic.twitter.com/toSffvZ2tS
— The Hill (@thehill) June 28, 2021
The level of gaslighting is astonishing.
The "Akshully it's them who want to defund the police" is the most impressive gaslighting operation in the media since "Akshully we always took the lab leak theory serious."
— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) June 29, 2021
Jen Psaki is trying to use the fact that Republicans voted against Biden’s ‘American Rescue Plan’ to make this claim because it has funding for law enforcement. That aspect of the plan was never part of the debate. This is a totally political sleight of hand.
Evie Fordham reports at FOX News:
Psaki casts GOP as party of ‘defund the police’ after slogan backfires on Democrats
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki accused Republicans of being the party of defunding the police on Monday — after “Defund the Police” became a rallying cry of progressive activists in 2020 and damaged Democrats’ appeal with moderate voters.
Republicans voted against President Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, which was signed in March, even though it included $350 billion for state and local governments that could be used for local police…
“Well, the president did mention that the American Rescue Plan, the state and local funding, something that was supported by the president, a lot of Democrats who supported and voted for the bill, could help ensure local cops were kept on the beat in communities across the country. As you know, [it] didn’t receive a single Republican vote. That funding has been used to keep cops on the beat,” Psaki said.
Here’s the video:
Absolutely shameless. Under questioning from Fox's Peter Doocy, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki argues it's *Republicans* who have been defunding the police and not supporting law enforcement because they didn't vote for Biden's stimulus boondoggle the American Rescue Plan. pic.twitter.com/pIwfFkonu1
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) June 28, 2021
Democrats think no one remembers anything from the last year.
So you are telling me that the Republicans were the ones that painted “defund the police” in big yellow letters in front of the WhiteHouse? https://t.co/sKH2RKpYQj pic.twitter.com/9qnBnLBTiJ
— Harrison Krank (@HarrisonKrank) June 29, 2021
This all comes down to something straightforward. Democrats have looked at their internal polls on crime and are panicking. Violent crime, including murder, is way up. Democrats know this issue could cream them in 2022.
Incredible stats, particularly in Portland pic.twitter.com/tX1ru4zx7k
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) June 28, 2021
I’ll leave you with this walk down memory lane:
Yes, Democrats support defunding the police. pic.twitter.com/HHXgJPXw2m
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) June 29, 2021
Featured image via YouTube.
DONATE
Donations tax deductible
to the full extent allowed by law.
Comments
And there will be people that will believe this BS.
And the biggest problem is that democrats really think that we are all that dumb.
Not really. Many will just adopt the party line knowing fully well that it is a lie. How out of touch does one have to be to not have noticed that ALL actors promoting de-fund the police are Democrats?
This is a great issue for us. No one out there can come up with even ONE example of this being true and we have to throw it in their faces over and over again. We win on this and Trump will have a field day with this.
Yes. We have to get over the idea that they lie because they are stupid. They lie because the truth opposes them. They know they are lying.
Right on cue, lil marx311 proves your point.
Only Democrats would be stupid enough to believe anything that Democrats say.
How Stupid how many decades has the GOP ran on law and order?
Once I read that Jen Psaki and Mazie Hirono were behind it, I knew it was absolute nonsense.
They only need AOC to complete the trifecta!
I did gaive Psaki a break at the beginning. She turned out to be a titanic hack. How anyone could lie with such lack of conscience – and for a the most scummy of people.
Not only are they abysmally stupid, they think we’re even stupider.
Not stupid, they know the the Fourth Estate has morphed into the Fifth Column. And they know hat their version of truth will be what is reported by the majority of ‘news’ and social media as well as many at Fox.
WE have been stupid. AMAZINGLY stupid: we hired, rehired, and re-rehired the GOP hacks who never stopped selling us out, while making themselves rich.
PROFESSIONAL GASLIGHTING
Rarely have I seen people caught in such transparent lies on a national stage.
DNC polling must show Dems really hurting from the “DeFund” stupidity. And it must be especially impacting independents the Dems who are not yet ideologues. (because the ideologues are already brainwashed to toe-the-party-line no matter what).
Follow up questions for Psaki:
Which localities have applied their ARP funding to hire additional LEO? Which have not?
ARP passed in March. Localities who relied upon the passage of ARP to hire additional LEO have had over 100 days to recruit and train an accelerated Police Academy Class. How many LEO have graduated and put into these communities?
How many LEO are currently in the Police Academy using the ARP funds today?
Are any of the ARP funds being used by localities which reduced their Police Department budgets?
Were all of these budget reductions based on a fiscal problem?
Which were not?
What was the number of active LEO in each locality pre civic? Pre Floyd/blm protests?
What is the number in each locality today?
How many LEO positions were eliminated by choice; where the council chose to redirect LEO funds to alternative programs?
Based on the answers to the above questions what percentage of unfilled current LEO positions are attributable to lack of applicants, early retirement and disability retirement claims?
Good questions, which is why they will never be asked.
“ Follow up questions for Psaki:”
Psaki…”I will have to circle back on that…”
RW,
As long as the circle is squared prior to the Infrastructure and reconciliation votes in the Senate.
Even if you accept the premise, can someone please ask Psaki:
How did the Republicans Defund the police if the stupid bill passed?
Chicago is only up 22%. This suggests that there may be a ceiling to how many can be murdered. Haven’t reached it yet, but they are trying. They have the most transparent admin….. so obvious are their lies.
Chicago’s murder rate is so high that even a “low” 22% is still a lot of dead bodies.
That’s all in the plan.
But so often we on the Right keep losing to these “stupid lying people”?
I would like to ask Psaki: when did Democrats denounce the cities that were defunding their police force? When did they denounce the people yelling “ACAB!”? When did they take their own to task, such as She Guevara and her mates in “The Squad”? Are they going to put pressure on DAs to stop letting violent criminals go without even the formality of a slap on the wrist?
I think the issue here is that a small number of the progressive element of the Democrats did call for defunding the police. However it really isn’t true to say the Biden adopted that position indeed his policy platform has always been to increase funding. Additionally some of the progressive elements calling for defunding were resisted at local level by democrat mayor’s. The reference to Republicans not supporting the bill that included additional funding for police is an interesting one, my question would be did Republicans negotiate to have that included within the bill, as opposed to whole sale rejection of the bill. If it’s the former then fair enough if it’s the later then it’s fair to say that Republicans have in effect defunded the police
I suppose we shouldn’t believe our lying eyes and ears, marx. Democrats were all aboard the “defund the police” train last year. To say otherwise, is a lie.
@Paddy M
The point i made was specifically that only a small group of progressives were calling for that, and that it was opposite to Bidens platform. Biden ran on a platform that included funding the police by an additional $300B. Given Biden is now President it seems fair to say that his policy platform is reflective of the Democratic platform. Thus stating that all Democrats were all aboard the defunding movement just isn’t true.
@Paul
Well I asked the question did the Republicans propose a counter to the bill proposed that did include additional funding for the police, can you answer that question?
Who has cut police budgets exactly, well the answer to that is pretty mixed, from what I’ve read something like 20 Democrat controlled cities have transferred money from the police budgets to more social welfare related budgets, the idea being that funding programmes that reduce crime might be more productive than more police and more jails. A similar number of Democrat cities have seen budgets go up. So the picture is a lot more complex than just ‘Demo’s are defunding’. The position is a lot more nuanced than that.
If your standard of argument is to advocate violence, then frankly you’ve lost already. That’s testament to the shallowness of your position.
List of cities that actually defunded the police. I’m sure I’ve missed a few. It’s late and I didn’t want to put a lot of effort into pounding a dolt over the head with a 2×4 of obvious truth. Once more for emphasis, the Democrats who run these cities didn’t just call for defunding the police. They actually cut police budgets:
Minneapolis
Seattle
New York
Chicago
Portland
Atlanta
Los Angeles
Baltimore
Philadelphia
Washington D.C.
Oakland
Yup. Only a small number of Democrats. Again, for the benefit of others as you, mark311 are simply an incompetently lying leftist shill who will try to downplay or weasel out of acknowledging the facts on behalf of your political masters, and provide a great deal of unintended comedy while doing which I quite enjoy, these cities actually “defunded” their police. For example.
https://nypost.com/2021/06/30/oakland-police-chief-rips-budget-cut-as-murder-rate-soars/
Or are you going to plead ignorant; that you didn’t know that Lori LIghtfoot and Bill DeBlasio, their entire city councils, and the mayors and members of the city councils in all those cities are Democrats? Whichever way you play it, you look like an idiot. Because you gotta be you.
It’s amazing to me that you can’t seem to read. I’ve already acknowledged in this very thread that a number of democrat controlled cities have reduced the police budget. Alongside this an equal number of cities increased there budget. The claim is that Democrats universally are calling for defunding the police and that GOP did not. My point is that it’s not actually a universal position amongst Democrats and indeed is exactly the opposite of the Presidential position, Biden ran on a platform which was to increase police budgeting. With respect to the Republican position no one has told me whether or not they proposed an alternative wording to the funding bill that included a significant increase to police funding I’ve been unable to find reference to Republicans doing that so on that basis it seems fair to say that Republicans as a whole (since there were 0 votes in favour) did not follow through with allocating funds to the police when they unanimously rejected the proposed bill.
It seems to me that you haven’t actually taken the time to read what I’ve said. Unlike many on both sides I don’t adopt a black and white view automatically. Maybe you should actually try and digest what the argument says rather than make silly blanket statements which don’t reflect what I’ve argued. Perhaps you misread what I wrote so I’m hoping the above gives greater clarity on the position that I’ve actually adopted rather than the straw man you’ve provided.
“My point is that it’s not actually a universal position amongst Democrats and indeed is exactly the opposite of the Presidential position, Biden ran on a platform which was to increase police budgeting.”
No one claimed that defunding the police is a “universal position amongst Democrats.” It was, however, a mainline position of party leadership. But pushing back against this notion was very nearly a universal proposition of the Republican party.
Also, Joe Biden did not run on a platform to “increase police budgeting.” In truth, Biden was inconsistent on this matter during his campaign, appearing to want to have it both ways. As an example of his “defund the police” stance, see:
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/biden-says-some-funding-should-absolutely-be-redirected-from-police
The right wing position has always been ‘democrats are defunding the police’ this very article makes that plain it’s the position and it’s repeated by a number of right wing platforms.
The link talks about a specific item which is surplus military equipment. It’s entirely reasonable to reject a continuation of the militarisation for the police
“I think the issue here is that a small number of the progressive element of the Democrats did call for defunding the police.”
This was, in fact, a MAINSTREAM Democrat position.
Police funding should be a local issue and should not be taken over by the federal government which will have federal controls attached. Refusing to support federal funding of Police is not DEFUNDING, No Republican came forward stating local law enforcement budgets should be reduced or departments eliminated. However, here is a PARTIAL list of mainstream Democrats who called for defunding the police.
President Joe Biden – said he supported “reallocating police resources” during his campaign.
Vice President Kamala Harris who applaud specifically the defunding the Los Angeles police, and said “we have to reimagine public safety” while discussing lowering the police presence in communities.
Biden’s Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta said officials must heed calls to “decrease police budgets and the scope, role, and responsibility of police in our lives.”
Biden’s Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh
Biden’s Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke wrote an op-ed for Newsweek in 2020 supporting efforts to “defund the police.”
Rep. Val Demings (D-IL) who supported the Minneapolis City Council ‘s effort to dismantle (not defund) the police.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) refused to criticize the Minneapolis City Council for defunding their police.
Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA)
Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN)
Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO)
House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-SC)
Democrat Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison
Former Rep. Joe Kennedy III (D-MA)
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY)
Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA)
I could on.
Again Bidens policy position was to increase funding and that’s reflected in the actual legislation proposed which was endorsed by Democrats. Given the size of the administration I’m not overly convinced that the list you present makes a compelling case for it being a majority opinion especially in light of actual legislation proposed. I tend to judge people on actions not words. It’s a valid point that the federal policy is different from local policies which are different and vary. I’ve already acknowledged that.
But Republicans were not the ones calling for defunding the police, were they? So the emanations from the Democrats stating an obvious falsehood is in fact an obvious falsehood, aren’t they?
You can be both against defunding the police and federal funding of local police forces. The two positions are not inconsistent. Clearly it is the Democrat party that has been trying to decimate local funding of police, with the support of top party leadership, as indicated by the people listed in my post above.
Please show me a similar list of Republicans calling for reductions in local funding for the police?
“Again Bidens policy position was to increase funding and that’s reflected in the actual legislation proposed which was endorsed by Democrats.”
To be clear, Biden’s current policy position is to increase FEDERAL funding for police from one can infer FEDERAL CONTROL of the police.
No Republican I am aware of is calling for reducing police funding at the local level.
Local police should be responsive to the communities they serve. Handing control to a distant federal government will remove this responsiveness and concentrates power and authority in the federal government, which is a step towards authoritarianism.
This Democrat argument is therefore, “If you are against federal control of local police, you are for defunding the police.”
This is a lie. Period.
This is of a piece with the old Dem pretense that increasing spending on some item by less than had once been planned is really a cut, and that taxing someone less than would otherwise have been the case is giving them something.
“Incredible stats, particularly in Portland”
Not enough, ladies!
Move it, move it, move it!
Harder, faster!
Let’s see those numbers SOAR!
This is better “election reform” than anything Republicans have proposed.
Very nice work here.
can’t Psaki get a better dye job?
After selling the hate crimes against asians narrative, they were feeling pretty confident.
It’s an easy sell. The same cities that were burned to the ground by BLM are now teaching BLM curricula. What load of crap will leftists not buy to avoid facing the fact their entire world view is wrong?
Democrats want everywhere to be as crime-infested as their strongholds. In the name of equity, you know.
Amen.
The vile, totalitarian Dhimmi-crats are never too ashamed or too dishonest to engage in brazen, utterly contrived and self-serving historical revisionism. The vile Dhimmi-crats are happy to concoct retrospective, fantasy re-tellings of events, so long as it advances their agenda and their propaganda narratives.
I’m curious. Does mark311 actually speak English?