In July of 2020, in the midst of this major uptick in homicides, the Federal Government, at the behest of President Trump, offered Chicago's Mayor Lightfoot assistance in dealing with the crisis. Mayor Lightfoot responded in a letter, “What we do not need, and what will certainly make our community less safe is federal agents deployed to Chicago. Any form of militarized assistance within our borders that would not be within our control or within the direct command of the Chicago Police Department would spell disaster.”
Evidently Lightfoot has changed her tune in light of the very deadly Independence Day weekend in her city and most likely because the bad Orange Man isn't President anymore. According to Yahoo News:
Everything possible? Did that include a $80M dollar budget cut to the CPD? Instituting "police reforms?" Has she instituted a "stop and frisk" policy?Lightfoot, who greeted Biden at the O’Hare International Airport on Wednesday, petitioned the president for assistance after Chicago saw more than 100 shootings over the Independence Day weekend, the deadliest weekend so far this year.
“This morning, we woke up to a city that is reeling yet again from another night of violence—this time not just against our residents, but against those who are sworn to protect us,” the mayor said in a statement about the shootings, which included at least 13 children and three police officers. “We must be united and all in the this together. Everyone from the federal government on down must do their part to address this scourge of violence.”
“Cities individually cannot tackle this problem. We just cannot. In Chicago, we’ve done absolutely everything possible, and we need help from the federal government."
Maybe, instead of focusing on reforming the Chicago Police Department, she should instead focus on reforming Chicago's criminal element?
And how about we stop focusing on race. Crime is crime no matter the race of the perpetrator. Supt. David Brown said that there are 117,000 gang members, who are part of the City of Chicago's 55 known gangs.
Of those 55 gangs, there are 747 factions, which also have 2,500 subsets.
"Any day of the week, any hour of the day, [there are] several hundred gang conflicts related to that 117,000 gang members," Brown said.
Now, there are around 13,000 sworn police officers in Chicago. By the time I finish typing there most likely will be less because of unprecedented levels of officer's retiring or quitting. When gang bangers are allowed to swell in numbers to the point they outnumber the cops 10 to 1, it's a recipe for disaster.
Starting today, known gang members seen on the street should be subject to stop and frisk. If they're guilty of felony carry, off to jail for at least two years. Numbers will start to drop in 30 days.
