Is It Time To Defund The Defunders?

Authored by Jim DeMint, op-ed via The Hill,

Like many Americans, Republicans have had a hard time coming up with a plan to fight back against antifa and the outraged mobs that have terrorized communities across the country. The main goal of these rioters is to defund police departments. It is so insane that it is hard to respond with anything more than confused laughter.

But conservatives in Congress have the right idea to defund the defunders.

Let us back up from the cable news hysteria and remember something important.

Police departments are the primary reason we have the government. When you get right down to it, the government has a monopoly on the legitimate use of force, which means its emissaries are paid to commit premeditated violence when necessary to enforce the laws. Police officers are the emissaries who carry guns and swear to use them only to enforce the laws written by the people.

Yet the party of big government has become so drunk on its “wokeness” that it now wants to eliminate the most basic core functions of the government like fighting crime, enforcing the laws, and protecting public safety. Defunding the police would be like putting on a football game without referees. Someone has to call penalties or the contest will descend into a brawl. There would be more injuries than points.

This principle can be doubly applied when you talk about criminals. What exactly is supposed to deter murderers, drug dealers, human traffickers, and sexual predators from openly plying their trade if there’s no one to stop them? If your city council defunds the police department, and you see a robbery taking place, who do you call? If criminals break into your own house, what are you supposed to do?

The activists have no answer to this. The best they have come up with is to replace police officers with social workers. They seem not to understand that the reason adults become criminals is because the authority structures of family and society have failed and, when that happens, the heroic efforts of social work have proven incapable of fixing the problem. What exactly are social workers supposed to do to armed bank robbers or drug cartel hit squads? Sing “Imagine” by John Lennon to them?

But it is much worse than that. After all, this summer we have seen a glimpse of what life would be like without police in Seattle and Portland. In Seattle, a mob took over a neighborhood, turned it into an autonomous zone, established physical barriers, and declared it an independent state not subject to the city or state. The local government told law enforcement to stand down. What followed was weeks of violent chaos.

The situation was perhaps even worse in Portland. The occupiers were not just trying to establish an autonomous zone outside the authority of the city and state. They actively tried to destroy the legitimate authority of their community. They attacked individuals, threw bottles at police officers, and set fire to the federal courthouse and other property. The liberal politicians in charge have largely sided with the mob. They are more upset about President Trump trying to restore order than the violent mob destroying their city.

These liberal politicians also seem to want to defund police departments. If cities and states are crazy enough to throw their people to the wolves, the Constitution may give them the right to be crazy, although when it involves federal laws and property, the federal government has legitimate reasons to intervene. But if these cities and states refuse federal support, the rest of us should not have to subsidize such lunacy.

Congress must ensure this country has serious leaders. Our lawmakers cannot just lock their doors and hide from the mob. They must take necessary action. When Congress passes its spending bills, it should deny federal law enforcement funds to city councils and state legislators that defund their police. If these mobs want to risk the lives of their fellow citizens to act cool, make them do it on their own dime. It is time to defund the defunders.