San Francisco Lawmaker Criticizes Lack Of Policing Despite Voting To Defund The Police In 2020
San Francisco District Supervisor Hillary Ronen is calling on the city to ramp up its efforts to fight the high crime rates the city is facing. Ronen, who represents the Mission District, attended a Budget and Appropriations Committee meeting where she criticized the police department’s lack of presence in the district she represents.
In the meeting, Ronen stated, “I’ve been begging this department to give the Mission what it deserves in terms of police presence all year long. And I have been told time and time and time and time again there are no officers that we can send to Mission.”
But here’s the irony: In 2020, Ronen was an avid supporter of the defund the police movement.
On August 16, 2020, Ronen tweeted out her support for defunding the police and reducing the number of officers in San Francisco. She actively campaigned and voted for a budget measure that would reduce the funds of the police department and reallocate the money toward social services.
“I want to make it clear that I believe strongly in defunding the police and reducing the number of officers on our force. For decades we’ve had an imbalance in our city’s budget, with hundreds of millions of dollars going to SFPD to have them do work they are not qualified to do.”
Hillary Ronen via Twitter
According to Fox News, San Francisco Mayor London Breed redirected over $100 million from law enforcement. Immediately after this was done, homicides rose by 17% the following year in the city. The San Francisco police department’s response times for police to arrive after someone called 911 were concerningly low.
With the rise of crime in major cities across the country, many liberal politicians and commentators are starting to shift their tone and abandon the ‘defund the police’ rhetoric. The White House has even gone so far as to accuse conservatives of being the ones who actually want to defund the police.
Despite this, the American people can remember who was calling for defunding the police during the BLM riots of 2020. Ronen’s flipflop is indicative of the failure of radical, liberal policies trying to be implemented in big cities.
