Minneapolis Officials Back Away from ‘Defunding’ Police as Budget Gets Slashed

In the wake of the tragic death of George Floyd over the summer, Americans began to take a look at just how our law enforcement system works at the ground level.

There is no doubt that police in America have an incredibly difficult job, and that there are situations that occur in that line of work that simply can’t be fathomed by those who’ve never been there.  But, alternately and just as undeniably, there have been instances in which police officers have acted cruelly and tragically – and this isn’t new.

Over the course of the second half of 2020, our nation has been grappling with these realties, with the far-left side of the spectrum pushing for initiatives to “defund the police”, which is a regrettably awful slogan.

Now, as crime in Minneapolis spikes, some lawmakers are making it clear that this is not something they are into.

Two Minneapolis City Council Members are denying their involvement with the “defund the police” movement just days after the council approved a budget that shifted approximately $8 million from the police department and months after they joined colleagues in calling for the dismantlement of the Minnesota city’s department.

City Council Member Steve Fletcher rejected the idea that the council’s goal was to defund the police during a recent interview with local news station KSTP-TV – and instead said the budget cuts came as a result of the need to fund other programs.

“‘Defund’ is not the framework the council has ever chosen,” Fletcher said during the interview that aired this week. He was seated next to Council Member Phillipe Cunningham, who agreed.

Fletcher and Cunningham were two of the nine city council members who attended an event in June where they stood behind a sign that stated “defund police” and said they would dismantle the police department, just weeks after the May 25 death of George Floyd, according to the report.

The $8 million that will be “shifted” away from the police department will help to fund a mental health contingent within the law enforcement bubble, hoping to prevent officers from having to apply their law enforcement training to situation that may be better handled by a medical professional.