On Sunday, Donald Trump made a campaign stop in Erie, Pennsylvania in support of Congressman Mike Kelly (R-Pa.) During his remarks, the subjects of both crime and illegal migration came up, giving the former President the opportunity to combine the issues in a unique and, in the opinion of some, "dangerous" way. With law enforcement being overwhelmed at times, Trump suggested that a one-day suspension of the rule of law may be required, effectively instituting a purge as was made famous in some shock-and-awe movies from the 2010s. To sweeten the deal, he volunteered Mike Kelly to take charge of the operation. This was clearly more of Trump's usual election hyperbole, but his remarks still had some heads exploding at the Huffington Post.
At a rally on Sunday in Erie, Pennsylvania, Trump casually seemed to suggest that one day of violence would put an end to crime.Trump declared that Rep. Mike Kelly (R-Pa.) should be put in charge for “one really violent day.”“One rough hour. And I mean real rough, the world will get it out and it will end immediately. End immediately. You know, it will end immediately,” he added without sharing any logistics.
The HuffPo was quick to label the remarks as "dangerous." They also referred to Trump's claims about rising crime rates and migrants contributing to that problem as "false." And since the left never misses an opportunity to underscore Trump's supposed "threat to democracy," they once again invoked the specter of the January 6 riots.
Rising crime rates are real and claiming otherwise is simply dishonest. It's true that some violent crime rates have dropped a bit since the wake of the BLM riots in 2020, but other types of crime - particularly retail theft - have simply been off the charts. It's also true that not all illegal migrants are here to engage in violent crime. Some merely show up to suck up all of our resources and create a general nuisance. But pretending that this applies to all migrants is equally dishonest. Look no further than the members of MS-13 and Tren de Aragua which have set up shop in the United States and gotten down to "business."
Among the many problems with Trump's proposed "purge" (aside from being blatantly unconstitutional) is that it simply wouldn't work. When you make all crime legal, you make crimes against innocent civilians legal as well as those committed against hardened criminals. We like to take comfort in the fact that the law-abiding outnumber the criminal element in America by a wide margin, but there are still far too many criminals out there. And they tend to be better at it because they have so much more practice under their belts. Also, if you allow that to go on for 24 hours, how sure are you that you'll be able to "turn it off" one day later? Once that genie is out of the bottle it might be very difficult to stuff it back inside.
Also, nobody seems to have asked Mike Kelly if he was interested in the job. That's probably not the sort of campaign promise that an up-and-coming politician wants on his record. I rather wish that Donald Trump would stick to his winning talking points on both crime and illegal migration. He has plenty of them to pick from. This type of talk is simply throwing more fuel on the fire.
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