I think it’s safe to say that the “Defund the Police” movement has been an epic failure both through the rejection of politicians and candidates for public office in swing districts who called for its implementation and the implementation itself in places where it’s been embraced, where we’ve also seen violent crime on the rise by double and in some cases triple digits.
Perhaps in no other Democrat-run city has the effort to starve police departments of much-needed funding been as much of a disaster as it has been in Minneapolis, considering that’s where the slogan “Defund the Police” gained prominence after the officer-involved death of George Floyd in May 2020. Their city council almost immediately moved to begin the process of stripping funding, and bragged about it during media interviews where they talked about “reimagining” community safety in the form of social workers and trusted neighborhood figures to resolve certain disputes.
As a result, there have been waves of resignations from police officers who felt like they had no support. Not surprisingly, officer recruiting has also been a problem in the city. Violent criminals took the opportunities that presented themselves and began doing their thing.
Residents of the city also narrowly escaped having significant staffing cuts made to its police force, but $8 million was still cut from the police budget through attrition, leaving police precincts significantly weakened.