The list continues to grow.
Democratic Rep. Barbara Lee of California is siding with President-elect Joe Biden, who told civil rights leaders in a private meeting that the “defund the police” movement killed the Democratic Party in the polls in 2020.
Lee, who is more liberal than centrist, threw her support behind the president-elect during an interview with CNN’s Erin Burnett.
“I want to give you a chance to react to President-elect Biden,” said the cable news host. “The quote he said is Republicans, quote, ‘beat the living hell out of us across the country,’ he says, because of the ‘defund the police’ movement, because of those words, and he says that is not what Democrats are talking about.” And she asked, “What’s your response? What do you say?”
Without batting an eye, the congresswoman, who is reportedly under consideration to replace Vice President-elect Kamala Harris in the Senate, replied, “Well, it’s not. Yes, it’s not, and President-elect Biden is absolutely correct.”
Lee continued, reiterating Biden’s overall point that the GOP made Democrats pay for “defund.” However, she added, it’s not that the movement itself is bad. It’s that Republicans have supposedly mischaracterized its goals.
“The Republicans in many ways weaponized police reform policies, and that is what they did in their ads, and that is the misrepresentation of what police reform is about,” said Lee.
Now is a good time to remind everyone that congressional Democrats killed South Carolina Republican Sen. Tim Scott’s police reform bill earlier this year.
“So,” Lee continued, “the Republicans have this way of just trying to misrepresent what we’re doing, so we move forward on our police reform efforts, and I believe that we’re going to be successful with the Biden-Harris administration.”
For the record, the “defund the police” movement’s most ardent supporters, including Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Rep.-elect Cori Bush of Missouri, and Project NIA Director Mariame Kabe, say the movement is exactly what it sounds like. They say they want the literal abolition of the police.
On CNN, Burnett kept at it, saying to Lee, “I just want to kind of push you a little bit more here. I understand your point about Republicans, but it isn’t just Republicans. There are Democrats who are saying that, too, and it appears that the president-elect is going to take them on.”
Lee responded, saying, “Most Democrats want to hold the police accountable. Most Democrats know that the police should not be delivering mental health services.”
“Most people know that the black and brown communities want public safety and that we have to restructure our funding priorities in terms of how we make our communities safe,” she said. “And so, most Democrats understand the need for accountability, and they need to make sure there is justice in our criminal justice system.”
OK, but there is also that whole “we mean literally abolish the police” thing. You can’t accuse Republicans of election-year trickery when they merely repeated back what the “defund” movement’s own backers are saying about it.
The funniest thing about all of this is that it is obvious “defund the police” hurt the Democrats in 2020. Yet, the ultra-liberal wing of the party continues to fight this assessment, indignantly and incessantly, going as far as to dismiss fellow left-wing luminaries, including former President Barack Obama, even though they are on their side.
Good idea, alienating your own allies after having already alienated voters. Surely, this is the path to meaningful reform.
