WH’s Endless COVID Excuse
It’s all Donald Trump’s fault. Or COVID. Whatever the issue, count on Team Biden to shift the blame to the pandemic — or the president’s predecessor. That’s precisely what happened Thursday when White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki — in an incredible stretch, even for her — claimed COVID-19 was a
“root cause” of the outbreak of smash-andgrab attacks plaguing the country.
“When a huge group of criminals organizes themselves, and they want to go loot a store, CVS and Nordstrom, a Home Depot, until the shelves are clean, you think that’s because of the pandemic?” asked Fox News’ Peter Doocy.
“I think a root cause in a lot of communities is the pandemic. Yes,” replied Psaki.
Then again, Biden himself has pointed to the coronavirus as a source of rising crime, but no one seriously believes that.
“This has nothing to do with the pandemic,” a former law-enforcement official and security consultant, Pete Eliadis, says. “The pandemic is overused at this point.” We’ll say!
But Psaki didn’t stop there. She also suggested Big Bad President Donald Trump failed to allot enough federal money for local cops, while Biden, by contrast, upped the aid.
Hello? Local crime is supposed to be dealt with by local communities using local funds. The smash-and-grabs are no more Trump’s fault (or COVID’s) than is the nationwide surge in murders.
The truth? Psaki and Biden are trying to cover for disastrous policies pushed by progressives in the nation’s Democraticrun cities — and by the president himself.
Blue states have removed consequences for crime, via measures like bail reform, lower penalties, higher thresholds for felonies and assorted legal handcuffs on cops. Woke prosecutors refuse to investigate crimes and charge criminals. Judges offer convicts lenient sentences or set them free altogether.
In 2014, California’s voters passed Proposition 47, which changed crimes like shoplifting and grand theft from felonies to misdemeanors. Raiding a store for goods valued at less than $950 became just a misdemeanor.
Meanwhile, prosecutors, like San Francisco’s Chesa Boudin, have signaled that they’ll all but close their eyes to low-level violations and perhaps even to some serious crimes.
Notably, Los Angeles and San Francisco along with some of its suburbs have suffered devastating attacks on retail outlets. A mob of 18 looters broke into a Nordstrom in LA last week.
In Walnut Creek, near San Francisco, 80strong stormed a Nordstrom in November, while another group hit ’Frisco’s Union Square, targeting 10 stores there. Stores in the Golden State are now closing by the dozen for fear of robbery.
New York City, too, has gone soft on crime in recent years and (surprise!) also seen shoplifting soar: By September, there were more such cases here up to that point than in 26 years. (Last year, murders here were also up more than 40 percent.)
Biden, Psaki & Co. have used the Trump and/or COVID excuse for other messes they’ve created — at the border, with the economy — and you can bet they will again. But you’d think at some point they’d realize Americans can simply no longer take them seriously.