Republican Congresswoman Elise Stefanik made an aggressive point that defunding the police will only hurt the very communities they’re trying to protect.
In an interview with Fox and Friends, Stefanik stood with America’s police:
“Our police are needed in the communities that are being hurt the most right now, where you are seeing the most violence. So, we need to defend the police, not defund the police..And, really look at how we can have positive change and that’s by increasing our training, that’s by increasing our community outreach. Not turning our backs on hardworking law enforcement.”
The 36-year-old U.S. Representative was the youngest person ever elected to Congress in 2015 when she was 30. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortex beat that record, while Stefanik is still the youngest Republican to have ever been elected to Congress.
Stefanik referenced the JUSTICE Act, which Senate Democrats blocked from passing, as one way to create change and healing with the law enforcement-citizen relationship. The JUSTICE Act, which was spearheaded by Senator Tim Scott (R-S.C.), the only black Republican in the Senate, was a productive means of bringing about change without going to destructive means of defunding our law enforcement.
Democrat leaders from across the country are caving to uninformed emotional cries from the social justice warrior-types and are actually considering defunding their police departments.
The passionate please come in the midst of national unrest following the death of George Floyd and other black deaths at the hands of police, justified and unjustified.
Stefanik acknowledged that change is necessary but that racism has gone both ways and defunding the police is not the remedy:
“You know, there has been footage of the just horrible, horrible statements made to our African-American law enforcement officers…There is no tolerance for racism in this country and we absolutely need to root out bad actors like the case of George Floyd’s murderers. But, we shouldn’t be turning our backs on police which unfortunately we are seeing in New York City today,” she said.
