We need a Blue New Deal from Sen. Markey

Sen. Ed Markey is taking every opportunity to disparage law enforcement and it is dangerous, irresponsible and shameful.

Just last week two Los Angeles County Sheriff ’s Department deputies were shot in the head in an ambush in Compton while sitting in their patrol car. One of the victims is a 31-year-old mother of a 6-year-old boy and the other is a 24-yearold man.

Video captured of the shooting shows the officers heroically tending to each other’s wounds moments after the shooting.

Miraculously, both deputies are expected to survive but they are lucky. Over 40 law enforcement officers have been killed in the line of duty in 2020 so far. Scores have been assaulted in violent protests and riots around the country and many are injured as a matter of course, week in and week out.

Tragically, the Bay State laid to rest one of its own law enforcement officers earlier this month when 58year-old Massachusetts State Police Trooper Thomas Devlin — a married father of four — died of injuries suffered in an accident when he was struck by a car over two years ago.

Devlin, of Wilmington, was struck by a Prius driven by a Haverhill man and was pinned between it and another vehicle while conducting a traffic stop on Route 3 in Billerica.

These are the horrific hazards of the job and elected officials should acknowledge those who operate amid them.

In recent days, however, Senator Markey has made law enforcement a target of his ire rather than the subject of admiration or praise.

“Portland police routinely attack peaceful protestors with brute force. We must disarm these officers, and every other police department in America, of weapons of war, and enact a nationwide ban on tear gas, rubber and plastic bullets, and bean bag rounds,” Markey tweeted last Monday.

In fact, Portland police had been entangled with violent rioters for more than

100 straight nights.

Senator Markey’s suggestion that they be disarmed illustrates a particular disdain for those men and women in uniform.

But the week wasn’t over for Senator Markey. He had more law enforcement lambasting to do.

He took aim at border agents, tweeting, “ICE has become a ruthless deportation force that terrorizes our immigrant communities. We cannot allow this to continue. It’s time to stand up to protect the rights and dignity of our immigrant neighbors and abolish ICE.”

ICE agents also put their lives on the line, routinely. They are out there everyday enforcing the laws that politicians like Ed Markey have written and passed and they are doing it with little fanfare.

In 2020, though, too many of our influential leaders in government have recast law enforcement as little more than a slur, never to be spoken of with anything but vitriol.

It is time that Senator Markey affirms his appreciation and respect for our law enforcement institutions. He has proven all-too-eager to participate in the performative rituals of those who want to dismantle them.

Now, as the election approaches we must know if the senator will have the backs of those who have ours.