Jason Rantz warns 'we're going to lose Seattle'
Seattle radio show host Jason Rantz joins Tucker Carlson on 'Tucker Carlson Tonight' to discuss the systematic demoralization of Seattle cops.
Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan has until Monday to decide whether she will veto a city council vote to slash the police budget amid pressure from some leaders to scale back funding for law enforcement.
The council endorsed a plan last week to cut the remaining police budget by 14%, including the elimination of the Navigation Team, which was created to help manage the city's homeless population. The team includes sworn officers and outreach workers who help place homeless people into housing.
“In some ways, the council was a little too cute,” Durkan told KOMO News in a wide-ranging interview.
EX-SEATTLE TOP COP BLASTS CITY COUNCIL OVER ‘KNEE-JERK’ REACTION TO CUT POLICE FUNDING
A man sleeps as a dog is walked behind him at Ballard Commons Park in Seattle. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren, File)
“I think their elimination of the Navigation Team and all the means we have to bring people inside, out of homelessness, getting cut was the wrong way to go," she added. “The city council has made its will very clear. It does not want us to move any encampments, regardless of what the public safety issues are or the health safety issues (and) that puts us in a very difficult position. We want to look at what the provisos mean, and we have to get an opinion as to what we are required to do versus what is suggested.”
Going forward, no one will be available to remove homeless encampments, Durkan said, a provision purposefully included by the council in an effort to halt efforts to relocate encampments regardless of the conditions.
Some council members have described the officers on the Navigation Team as "homeless camp sweepers," according to the news station. The department has halted the clearing of encampments not deemed a safety hazard or an obstruction, since the coronavirus pandemic set in.
In a statement to Fox News, Durkan's press secretary, Kelsey Nyland, said the mayor has not made a decision regarding a veto but is "hopeful that she and the City Council will reach a consensus and identify a path forward."
If Durkan does veto the legislation, it would go back to the council for reconsideration. The nine-member body would need a supermajority to override the veto.
City leaders and criminal justice advocates have pushed to chip away the police department's annual $400 million budget amid calls for police reform. Seattle, like other cities, has continued to grapple with ongoing protests that have sometimes turned violent during escalations between protesters and authorities.
“The police have a really hard job right now, there’s no question about that," Durkan told the news station. "I won’t call them protests; I’ll call them gatherings and direct action whose sole purpose was to cause destruction and vandalism."
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City leaders have pushed to reduce the police budget in favor of social programs. In response to the cuts, which called for removing 100 officers from the force, Police Chief Carmen Best announced her resignation last week.
"The push from the council and some of our community is to do these large-scale changes in 2020 with no practical plan for community safety," she said at a news conference earlier this month.
Meanwhile, Durkan, a Democrat, is appealing a recent court ruling that allowed a recall effort to remove her from office to move forward.
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