The Democrat-controlled Minneapolis City Council is reportedly panicking as violent crime is surging throughout the city after they called for defunding the police department following the death of George Floyd in late May.
During a two-hour Minneapolis City Council meeting on police reform, “council members told police Chief Medaria Arradondo that their constituents are seeing and hearing street racing which sometimes results in crashes, brazen daylight carjackings, robberies, assaults and shootings,” MPR News reported. “The number of reported violent crimes, like assaults, robberies and homicides are up compared to 2019, according to MPD crime data. More people have been killed in the city in the first nine months of 2020 than were slain in all of last year. Property crimes, like burglaries and auto thefts, are also up. Incidents of arson have increased 55 percent over the total at this point in 2019.”
“Residents are asking, ‘Where are the police’?” said city council member Jamal Osman. MPR News says that Osman indicated that he has been flooded with complaints with residents that their calls for help from the police are not being answered. The report said that some city council members whose constituents live in safer areas are now feeling “terrorized.”
“That is the only public safety option they have at the moment: MPD,” Osman said. “They rely on MPD. And they are saying they are nowhere to be seen.”
City Council President Lisa Bender, who led the charge in the initial calls to defund the police department, complained that she thought the officers were being defiant.
“This is not new,” Bender claimed. “But it is very concerning in the current context.”
The news comes as approximately 100 officers have left the department or taken a leave of absence since the start of the year, more than double the normal rate.
Councilmember Phillipe Cunningham called out those on the city council who were complaining about the lack of a policing after they had called for defunding the police department.
Cunningham said, “What I am sort of flabbergasted by right now is colleagues, who a very short time ago were calling for abolition, are now suggesting we should be putting more resources and funding into MPD.”
Just days after Floyd’s death, the Minneapolis City Council voted unanimously to pass a resolution to replace the Minneapolis Police Department with a supposed “community-led public safety system.”
“Our commitment is to end our city’s toxic relationship with the Minneapolis Police Department,” Bender said. “It is clear that our system of policing is not keeping our communities safe. Our efforts at incremental reform have failed, period.”
Bender proceeded to do a series of media interviews in which she gave controversial answers to basic questions about the city council’s proposal.
“Do you understand that the word, dismantle, or police-free also makes some people nervous, for instance?” CNN’s Alisyn Camerota asked Bender. “What if in the middle of night, my home is broken into? Who do I call?”
“Yes, I mean, hear that loud and clear from a lot of my neighbors,” Bender responded. “And I know — and myself, too, and I know that that comes from a place of privilege. Because for those of us for whom the system is working, I think we need to step back and imagine what it would feel like to already live in that reality where calling the police may mean more harm is done.”
When asked during a separate CNN interview what would happen if a killer was running loose and an armed police officer was needed, Bender admitted, “we don’t have all the answers.”
Others, like the congresswoman who represents the district, far-left Rep. Ilhan Omar (D), called the police department a “cancer.”