Before a spate of mass shootings in Milwaukee, Buffalo, Orange County, and Uvalde rocked the country, President Joe Biden urged state and local officials to devote additional resources to law enforcement.
Appearing at an event at the White House alongside Attorney General Merrick Garland and a bipartisan group of law enforcement officials, Biden reiterated his view that the answer to reducing violence “is not to defund the police. The answer is to fund the police with the resources and training they need to protect our communities.”
Biden’s landmark American Rescue Plan – the first major legislative accomplishment of his presidency – has led to more than $10 billion being committed directly to public safety across more than 300 communities nationwide. These resources were provided directly to states, counties, and cities to hire police officers and ease the burden on law enforcement caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
In Wisconsin, Democratic Governor Tony Evers has been among those putting American Rescue Plan dollars to work funding police and law enforcement across the state. Evers recently announced that every single law enforcement agency in the state would receive a portion of $100 million for violence prevention, victim services and criminal justice.
Not a single Republican in Congress – including Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson – voted for the American Rescue Plan that is currently keeping police officers on the job and making communities safer.
The facts of Biden and Evers ongoing commitment to ensuring that law enforcement has the resources it needs to serve local communities is inconvenient to Republicans working to paint Democrats as out of touch on the issue of public safety.
But it doesn’t change the facts. Biden and Evers aren’t just talking about funding the police. They’re doing it.
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