© AP Photo/Elaine ThompsonSeattle Police Chief Carmen Best
"Socialists" on Seattle's City Council are holding a "reasonable majority" of residents hostage by threatening to slash police spending by 50 percent, a union leader said Saturday.
"It's absolutely a travesty," said Seattle Police Officers Guild President Michael Solan, appearing on "Fox & Friends Weekend."
Solan warned that the defund police push in Seattle is "leading the way in how public safety will be conducted from this day forward" nationwide.
"If our reasonable community across this city, our state, and more importantly, our nation don't wake up ... crime will rise significantly, and over half, if not more, of the police jobs in our city will be eviscerated," Solan said.
"This is coming into your neighborhood if we don't wake up and stop this socialist threat immediately."
The Seattle Times reported Thursday that three council members have thrown their support behind Decriminalize Seattle and King County Equity Now. The paper described Decriminalize Seattle as a coalition inspired by the Black Lives Matter protests that seek police defunding and major reforms aimed at ending systemic racism.
The Times said seven out of the council's nine members support defunding police. The department's budget is currently $409 million.
That means there's enough support on the council to defund police without DemocraticMayor Jenny Durkan's approval.
Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best told "The Jason Rantz Show" on Friday that the council members who support defunding police don't have a real plan.
"All they have shown us is that they want to reduce the budget by 50 percent. I haven't seen any real planning in that. And, the real tragedy of doing that is that we will lose 1,100 employees," she said.
Solan offered a more ominous prediction, saying Seattle will be "plagued with crime" if defunding moves forward.
"As police officers, we're engaging in this reimagining or re-envisioning police services to our entire city as we must because we serve at the will of the community," he said.
"But sadly, this socialist city council controlled by a certain group of individuals that have the entire council, if not more importantly our ignored majority, hostage by their political antics, must be stopped."
Let them see just how fast the entire city becomes lawless like the CHAZ CHOP experiment did.
It is what the "socialists" of Seattle want. Minimal law enforcement and then let the neighborhoods police themselves. The gangs will take control and then turf wars between the gangs can erupt. Crime of all kinds will go up, life expectancy goes down and the "socialists" win.
Not the Seattle I would ever visit again or choose to make my home, but maybe it will appeal to the socialists and they can move there instead.
B.C.