OPINION:
CHICAGO — Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker has called to standby status about 150 members of the Illinois National Guard to assist the already sizable police presence — including those from departments outside Chicago — on hand to handle the expected crowds, protesters and agitators at this week’s Democrat National Convention.
It’s good to be a Democrat politician. They get all the security. Just ask Donald Trump.
But really, for a city that’s known for high crime, all-the-time crime, round-the-clock crime, gang crime, thug crime, violent crime and regular weekend crimes of murder — it’s a tad despicable to see that when security is perceived as necessary — when the high brow are in town — then security, by gosh, is not just top notch. It’s full blown. It’s armed, and then some.
“We want to ban assault weapons,” Kamala Harris, vice president-turned-presidential hopeful, said a few weeks back.
But not for her security force.
Not for her fellow Democrats in Chicago.
“Gov. JB Pritzker confirmed there were about 150 Illinois National Guard members on ‘standby’ for the DNC,” Block Club Chicago wrote.
And from Fox 32: “Governor JB Pritzker confirmed Sunday that about 250 members of the Illinois National Guard have been called up to be on standby during the convention.”
From Block Club Chicago again: “There will also be about 250 military police members in the city if they are needed.”
From ABC 7: “There will be some backup from [police] departments outside Chicago, including Milwaukee.”
From ABC 7: “The U.S. Secret Service is in charge of securing convention venues, delegates, party officials and candidates, employing hundreds of federal officers from specialized teams at other agencies including the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ bomb-detecting canine units and explosives technicians on standby.”
City police. Police from outside the city. Federal bomb experts and their dogs. The National Guard. Secret Service. Specialized police forces and investigative teams and law enforcement experts. It’s good to be a Democrat politician or a Democrat politician’s friend, because usually, the city looks like this: “Chicago led nation in homicides for 12th year in a row,” Wirepoints reported in January.
The Chicago Tribune reported that so far this year, the city’s seen 353 homicides. It’s only August. What’s interesting is these homicides, these acts of violence, these fatal firearms’ deaths — they occur within the bubble of some of the strictest gun control laws in the country.
But Democrats have an answer for that. They blame the surrounding states.
“Despite being a national leader in enacting gun violence prevention laws, Illinois continues to experience an unacceptable rate of gun violence,” EveryTown Research wrote. “Illinois is surrounded by states with much weaker laws, and an outsized share of likely trafficked guns recovered in Illinois are originally purchased out-of-state — especially in Indiana, just across the border from Chicago.”
It’s the Second Amendment’s fault. It’s not ours — such is the line of logic from leftists and Democrats. Nothing about the links of crime to broken homes. Nothing about the ties of fatherless homes to youth crime and gang activity. Nothing — nothing! — about the flow of illegals Democrats have welcomed via their open border agendas, and all the crime and drug and gang activities these illegals bring.
The citizens of Chicago have become political casualties for leftists who want to destroy the Second Amendment, destroy traditional family unit, destroy law and order, destroy the border, destroy — ultimately — America.
Democrats know how to protect and secure. They do it when they want to; they’re doing it now, in Chicago, for their elites in their political circles. They do it with police. They do it with specially trained agents. They do it with guns and ammo and no-nonsense demeanors that push the undesirables far from the presence of the elite class by creating and maintaining buffer zones and so-called protest zones. In other words, they create borders around their safely guarded convention site, and then they protect those borders with an armed and militarized force.
It sure is nice to be a Democrat politician.
If only Democrats who control the city would do the same for their residents once the convention leaves town.
If only Democrats would do the same for all of America, for all American citizens.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley. Listen to her podcast “Bold and Blunt” by clicking HERE. And never miss her column; subscribe to her newsletter and podcast by clicking HERE. Her latest book, “Lockdown: The Socialist Plan To Take Away Your Freedom,” is available by clicking HERE or clicking HERE or CLICKING HERE.
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