While the Left will tell us crime rates are down, the reality is quite different. According to a recent analysis of data, crime is actually up in 66 cities across the country and violent crime us up 25%.
One of the places struggling with crime is California. The wounds are all self-inflicted: the Golden State has been soft on crime for many, many years. That's why they have roving, organized mobs of shoplifters ransacking retailers in LA; in San Francisco, the city's last Denny's closed thanks to a rash of dine-and-dashing and businesses are leaving in droves.
Governor Gavin Newsom tried to brag about the 'progress' the state has made in combating organized retail theft, but the reality of math took the wind out of his sails. Newsom is also pushing legislation to further address shoplifting, 'smash-and-grab' robberies, and car thefts (weird thing to push if crime is down, right?):
New California laws aim to reduce smash-and-grab robberies, car thefts and shoplifting https://t.co/2epUXThZ9n
— The Associated Press (@AP) August 16, 2024
California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday signed a bipartisan package of 10 bills that aims to crack down on smash-and-grab robberies and property crimes, making it easier to go after repeat shoplifters and auto thieves and increase penalties for those running professional reselling schemes.
The move comes as Democratic leadership works to prove that they’re tough enough on crime while trying to convince voters reject a ballot measure that would bring even harsher sentences for repeat offenders of shoplifting and drug charges.
While shoplifting has been a growing problem, large-scale, smash-and-grab thefts, in which groups of individuals brazenly rush into stores and take goods in plain sight, have become a crisis in California and elsewhere in recent years. Such crimes, often captured on video and posted on social media, have brought particular attention to the problem of retail theft in the state.
But the part that caught my attention comes further down in the article (emphasis added):
Democratic lawmakers, led by Newsom, spent months earlier this year unsuccessfully fighting to keep a tougher-on-crime initiative off the November ballot. That ballot measure, Proposition 36, would make it a felony for repeat shoplifters and some drug charges, among other things. Democrats worried the measure would disproportionately criminalize low-income people and those with substance use issues rather than target ringleaders who hire large groups of people to steal goods for them to resell online.
Oh, really?
Here's the background. Back in April, organizers of the group Californians for Safer Communities submitted 900,000 signatures to get Proposition 36 on the ballot. Retailers (you know, the ones getting robbed blind) backed the initiative and nearly one million people said they want government to crack down on crime.
This makes sense. Crime negatively impacts communities -- especially low-income communities -- hard. Businesses close, property values decline, and streets are unsafe. Understandably, the residents of these communities have said enough is enough.
Through the democratic process, they are demanding the government crack down on this crime. This has echoes of Proposition 8, the 2008 initiative that outlawed gay marriage. It passed with 52% of the vote.
But I digress.
The Democratic Party brags about how it defends democracy, and that democracy is under attack from President Trump and the GOP.
In this case, Gavin Newsom and the California Democrats are telling voters they don't matter. Their desire to stop retail theft and punish the criminals doesn't matter. The Democratic Party is making it explicitly clear they will go to the mattresses for criminals over the law-abiding citizens living in the communities those criminals terrorize and destroy.
They couch it in Orwellian terms about 'disproportionately criminalizing' low-income people, but don't fall for the semantics. The fact the majority of perpetrators come from certain demographics does not mean enforcing the laws is racist or discriminatory.
The people demanding tougher law enforcement and criminal punishment are also often low-income. After all, it's their stores and neighborhoods being targeted, and they're the ones being victimized by crime.
There is zero reason for Newsom to oppose an initiative like Prop 36. The self-proclaimed 'defenders of democracy' should welcome the vote and -- if they disagree with Prop 36 -- make a case against it.
Yet every single time the will of the people clashes with the desires of the Democratic leadership, all pretense of defending democracy and it's vital importance to America goes right out the window. From trying to remove opposition candidates from the ballot to opposing referendums like Proposition 36, it's not a coincidence.
It's who the Democrats are.
