One year ago, the streets of American cities were filled with protests in the wake of the death of George Floyd. As public opinion shifted briefly in the direction of the Black Lives Matter movement, progressive activists embraced the slogan “defund the police,” and in some cities, such as Minneapolis, elected officials moved toward doing just that. More recently, some far-left leaders, including Rep. Rashida Tlaib, have taken their rhetoric a step further, calling for “no more policing.”
But it turns out even people who say they want to “defund the police” don’t actually want less police — and this is creating a political problem for Democrats in cities across the country.
Extreme positions such as abolishing the police are only supported by one in six voters. But in that same Gallup polling, half of the respondents last summer said they’d support “eliminating officer enforcement of nonviolent crimes” and “reducing the budgets of police departments and shifting the money to social programs.”
Some activists who support “defund the police” are quick to point out that what they really mean is redirecting that funding to other services and programs. But not all activists agree. And so in a recent survey I conducted for the Manhattan Institute, we went beyond the slogan but preserved the use of “defund” since it is the language used by advocates: “Defund the NYPD and spend that money on social workers instead.”
Framed in that way, the policy splits New York City voters down the middle, with 46% supporting the policy and 44% opposing. At first glance, that would seem to be far from political kryptonite. But when we asked those same New Yorkers about whether they’d want a larger or smaller police presence in their community, their tunes changed dramatically. Half of New York City voters said they want a larger police presence in their local area than exists, and another 30% said to keep things as they are. Only 15% said they want a smaller police presence.
Notably, nearly 4 in 10 people who said they supported defunding the New York Police Department also said they’d like an increased police presence in their own neighborhood. And that half of New Yorkers who want more police is a multicultural one. The biggest demographic determinant is age. About 27% of New Yorkers under 30 want less policing in their area, a far higher percentage than older age groups.
“Defund” may seem OK in theory to some voters in liberal cities, but when it comes to their local areas, that’s where things get more complicated. That may be why the top candidates for mayor in New York City have backed away from “defund” and are trying to thread the needle between the demands of progressive activists and the rising frustrations city residents have around public safety and crime.
In cities that have loosened up policing of offenses like shoplifting, the consequences are all too clear. Even Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey last month acknowledged the connection between a significant increase in crime in the city and the reforms pushed the prior year. Voters in liberal Austin voted by a 57-42 margin to reinstitute criminal penalties for camping in public spaces, a reaction to the problems that accompany the city’s growing homeless population.
This week, video in San Francisco went viral showing a shoplifter in a Walgreens filling a trash bag with goods and running out the door without paying. The rise in crime has additional retailers such as Gap and CVS closing locations in the city, and the ability of petty criminals to act with impunity has made working, living, and doing business in urban areas unappealing to many. In the aforementioned Manhattan Institute poll of New York City voters, 71% of respondents, including 68% of Democrats, said they would support policy changes that would “empower police officers to be more responsive to quality-of-life issues in communities, such as graffiti, public urination, littering, and subway fare evasion.”
A large majority of voters believes there should be reforms in how we police in America. And there are plenty of policies that can reform policing and our justice system broadly to prevent abuses while preserving the ability of law enforcement to do their job: to enforce the law. Policies such as changes in recruiting and training and reforming qualified immunity get much higher support than getting rid of police or reducing their presence altogether.
American cities are often bastions of liberal policy. But even the left-leaning voters who live in urban cores are seeing the consequences of rising crime and are admitting: Don’t take my police away.
