- The Washington Times - Saturday, October 29, 2022

As children take to the streets to trick-or-treat, parents across the country can’t help but be filled with fear of what they may encounter.

Though Democrats would like to deny it, violent crime is on the rise in 2022, following a previous unprecedented spike in homicides. According to a study by Fox News Digital, violent crimes (including reports of rape, sexual assault, robbery, assault and murder) in Baltimore, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York City, Seattle and Washington, D.C., have increased from nearly 5% to up to 40% compared with the same time frame in 2021. In cities run by Democrats, major crimes such as aggravated assault, carjacking and robbery continue to rise higher than in previous years.

To make matters worse, President Biden’s open borders have led the Drug Enforcement Administration to warn parents of brightly colored “rainbow fentanyl” that could be included in their children’s candy buckets. Rainbow fentanyl has been designed to look like candy, with officials reporting that the illicit drug has been discovered disguised as Skittles, Whoppers and SweeTarts. 

Fentanyl is now the leading cause of death for Americans aged 18 to 45, killing nearly 73,000 people, or more than 1,400 a week, from April 2021 to April 2022, according to CDC data. The deadly drug killed more Americans than gun and auto-related deaths combined. Fentanyl is deadly enough to kill an adult with a dose as small as 2 milligrams (a dime weighs roughly 2,700 milligrams). In September alone, 1,826 pounds of fentanyl was seized at the southern border, with much more likely getting through. The amount of fentanyl seized in September is the equivalent of more than 414 million lethal doses — more than enough to kill every single American.

More fentanyl has crossed the border in the last two months under the Biden administration than in all of fiscal 2019 under President Donald Trump.

Earlier this month, Pennsylvania State University put out a memo warning its students about rainbow fentanyl. In June, police seized 2,210 bags of fentanyl in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania. In May, a 2-year-old in the Keystone State died of an overdose, with two other children in the house surviving. In August in Georgia, a 6-month-old who was exposed to the drug died, and in June, a 15-month-old overdosed.

Yet nothing is being done to secure our southern border, where cartels are running rampant. Investigations estimate that Mexican cartels are making $13 billion a year smuggling drugs and immigrants into the U.S., 26 times what they made in 2018. 

Keep in mind that all 48 Senate Democrats and two independents voted against hiring 18,000 Border Patrol agents, which could add much-needed manpower to the border to stop the flow of drugs. And in Mr. Biden’s first 100 days, he took more than 90 executive actions on immigration, including halting the construction of the border wall and ending the Trump administration’s successful “Remain in Mexico” policy.

In terms of crime, Democratic Senate candidates Raphael Warnock, Cheri Beasley, John Fetterman, Tim Ryan and Mandela Barnes all support ending cash bail which would lead to more criminals back on the street. As a result of Democrats’ “defund the police” push, major cities like New York, Portland, Oregon, and St. Louis have seen their police forces shrink at alarming rates.

A recent NPR poll found that a quarter of American adults say they live in fear of being attacked in their own neighborhoods, and a Harvard Caps/Harris poll found 64% of Americans blame “woke politicians” for the recent spike in crime.

It doesn’t have to be this way. Democrats’ soft-on-crime and open border policies have failed demonstrably. It’s time to secure the border, fund the police, restore cash bail, and prosecute and put criminals in jail.

Vote red in November.

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