Episode 15: The War on Cops with Heather Mac Donald

of course, they're killed by white cops. Otherwise, or woke cultural elites couldn't give a damn. This is the Truth with Lisa Booth. Ye, welcome back to the Truth with Lisa Booth. The police are under siege in America today. Democrats, the media, and army of radical activists are out in the streets calling to defund the police, demonizing the people who serve to protect us, attacking officers just for doing

their jobs. And what's the result of all that? Violent crime in America is skyrocketing in our cities, and no one is suffering more as a result than minorities. My guest today is the one who wrote the book on this. She wrote The New York Times bestseller The War on Cops, which is essential about the conversation we're having today. She's also a lawyer by training and a fellow at the

Manhattan Institute. I could go on and on about Heather's resume, but I'm just going to sum it up with this, and two thousand eighteen, then Attorney General Jeff Sessions called Heather the greatest thinker in criminal justice in America today. So this is an issue that has been on my mind a lot. It's something when you look at the data, when you look at the facts, it doesn't match the public narrative. Yet that doesn't seem to matter to the media and to the left to continue to push this

lie about the police and police shootings. I'm so thankful to have Heather McDonald on this podcast for this week's episode to get into all of this. Heather, thanks so much for taking the time. Lisa, thank you so much for having me on pleasure talking to you. We live in this post truth world where facts don't seem to matter. I mean, even looking at the Washington Post database, so one thousand people shot and killed by the police either

had a knife or gun. Only five point three percent of those shot and killed were actually unarmed, and then when you look at those unarmed, it's twenty four white people, almost eighteen were black. Almost. But why do people keep pushing this narrative that simply isn't supported by the facts. It's astonishing. I mean every day I sort of rubbed

my eyes and think I'm dreaming. It's amazing to me that we continue talking about the police when this country is living through a crime wave of unprecedented proportions where every single day you have dozens of blacks getting gunned down and drive by shootings to fatally to absolutely no acknowledgement by the mainstream media. That's more than all white and Hispanic homicide victims combined. Uh. And yet we're talking about phantom police racism and it's a it's it's an

utter puzzle. Uh. The count returns its eyes away from the just grotesque and barbaric behavior that is leading to this loss of black life in inner city areas. We don't want to acknowledge it. Uh. I fear that elite whites feel that the behavior gap, the crime gap, is insoluble, and so they'd rather talk about something other than that. But it is a complete breakdown in public policy, and

as you say, it's a truth gap. The perception that we're living through a epidemic of racially biased fatal police shootings of blacks is an optical illusion. It is created by selective media coverage. The public thinks that most of the people shot by the police are black. In fact, about of people fatally shot by the police each year black over fifty or white. Uh. There's been white victims in There was a man in Dallas, Tony Tempa, who was killed by the police in the situation that was

eerily foreshadowing the George Floyd death. He was pinned under officers for thirteen minutes, unable to breathe. They were joking the whole time. Nobody knows Timpa's name because it does not fit the narrative. The only thing that the allegedly anti racist UH, left wing press, the only time they care about black lives is when they're taken by a cop. Uh. And the only police shootings that the media cares about is against black See the one fatal police shooting in

the January six riot. Whatever happened to Ashley Babbitt, You know, it's down the memory hole because she's white. That was a bad shooting. Nobody talks about it. It is it is just a completely surreal and dysfunctional situation. Well it it puts police officers in a an impossible situation when we saw that with the Macaya Bryant shooting, which is sad that it's her name that is remembered when she was the aggressor of not her potential victim. You have

a white cop, I believe it was Columbus, Ohio. You've a white cop saved a young black woman's life from getting stabbed by Macaya Bryant. Yet he is still being painted as racist simply because of the color of her skin, even though he was trying to save a black life. Yes, it's just it's remarkable. Cops are it is the most disheartening, spirit killing, soul crushing profession at this point because they are the object of completely irrational hatred. They can never

clear their name of being racist. Now, the cops that I speak to just keep close to their arts, the notion, the belief that the good people in the community support them, and by and large that's true. There is a well spring of unacknowledged support for proactive policing, especially among elderly blacks who are terrified by these feral youth that are spraying passers by with guns, that are killing one year old, six year old, nine year olds in their beds, again

to no acknowledgement by the press. So the police officers try to hold onto that belief, but the loudest voices in the culture are telling them that they are the source of oppression. As we know that there is a huge exodus from from the police ranks. People are taking early retirements, They're telling their family members, their friends don't even think about being a police officer. When cops get out of their cars these days, they frequently find themselves

surrounded by hostile during outs. We are playing with fire, Lisa, because Americans are naive. They they buy in large enjoy a stable society, uh the rule of law. We're naive about the the hatred and violence that links lurks beneath the service. We saw that with the riots, uh and and again we turned our eyes away. This summer is

going to be even worse the violence. This year outpaces saw the largest increase in homicides on a percentage basis in this nation's history, and it is far worse this year. Uh So so by demonizing the cops, we are demonizing the very possibility of a civil society, which is respect for criminal justice and the foundation of law and order. When did this war on cops begin Well, I certainly became aware of it in the nineties with the driving

well black conceit, which was another optical illusion. Lisa, if there's one thing that your listeners should take away from our conversation, it's this the problem of the benchmark. If they can understand the benchmark issue, they will be able to take on every Black Lives Matter activists. Here's here's what the left does to generate its phony idea of racism,

and this bears on the driving while black issue. In car stops, they compare police data police activity data like police stops or arrests, to population ratios, and if the police rate of activity with any given racial group is larger than that group's percentage of the population, they declare racism. So, for example, in New York City, blacks are about twenty three percent of the city's population, but of all the pedestrian stops that the police make that is the stop,

question and frisk. In legal terminology, it's they're known as terry stops. These are the discretionary stops that officers make to ask, as a suspect somebody engaging in suspicious behavior, what are you doing? You know, why are you here? Maybe frisking the the suspect of those stops. In New York City, blacks makeup about fifty three percent of all stop subjects, So that's twice as much as the black population.

So the a c l U, the Black Lives Matter activists, the Patrice Colors, and Deroy mckesson's look at that and say, ah, the police are racially profiling. But population is not the relevant benchmark. It's what the left uses. It is not the right benchmark. Here's what you've got to compare police activity to crime. Policing today is data driven. Police go where people are most being victimized, and that's in minority neighborhoods.

Here's the relevant benchmark for assessing pedestrian stops. Who's doing the shootings? And in New York according to the victims of and witnesses to those shootings, Blacks commit about seventy five percent of all shootings, though they're tent of the population. Whites commit about two to three percent of all shootings. Though they're thirty four percent of the population. So when you compare police stops to criminal activity, which is what

drives those stops, they're not racially profiling. So to get back to your question of when did this begin. In the nineties, we saw the racial profiling idea, the driving well black idea, again based on a phony benchmark, uh the A C L. You would say, well, in this city, blacks are x percent of the population, but x percent of car stops are of blacks. Therefore there's racial profiling. What was rarely asked was who's breaking the traffic laws?

And it turns out that blacks break traffic laws also disproportionately. This was there was a brief moment when it was allowable as an academic to study driving patterns, and one of the studies showed that black speed at twice the rate of whites on the New Jersey Turnpike in the Garden State Parkway in New Jersey. Another study in North Carolina found similar things. The Transportation Department has an entire program devoted to what it calls the Nexus of crashes

and crime. It finds that d driving behavior, fatal car accidents, pedestrian accidents are worse in high crime communities because the same people engaged in the violence are also driving like maniacs. So this driving well black conceit is another optical illusion that is based on our unwillingness to look at the reality of behavior. So we got the nineties, you know,

that was the big thing, driving well black. Then we had two thousand one, we had nine eleven, and for a brief moment, the cops were the good guys again, and they were being greeted, you know, and and uh, people were saying thank you, thank you. And this was a bittersweet moment for them because they overnight they've gone from being the dogs to the heroes. And they knew

it wouldn't last. Nadda didn't. And and meanwhile, you know, the academic narrative got more and more left wing about systemic bias, and very quickly, uh me, once again, we're blaming the cops as a messenger in order not to talk about black crime. Let's take a quick commercial break back on the other side. One of the big moments that stands out to me is Ferguson And just as a case study about how easily false and narratives are

told and pushed. I mean, you look at the shooting that took place in with Michael Brown and Officer Darren Wilson. Even before having all the facts we had, the President of the United States goes out and makes a statement saying, we lost a young man, Michael Brown, and a heartbreaking and tragic circumstances. He was eight years eighteen years old. His family will never hold Michael in their arms again.

He and he makes the statement as rioters are already out in the streets of Ferguson before having all the facts. He also mentioned Ferguson on the world stage at the UN General Assembly. You know how much responsibility, uh does in did former President Obama in pushing some of these false narratives about the police. Well, he definitely was part of the problem, uh, And and was not driven by

the facts, as you say, Lisa, I don't know. I suppose if it had been uh, you know, President Trump during those years, who was a police supporter, we might not have been here today. That having been said, Uh, it was sort of overdetermined. You know, you had the rising left, You had the academic world pumping out every year, graduates who have been imbued in the idea of phony racism.

Uh so it may have sort of happened anyway, but but certainly Biden had, I mean, rather, Obama created some tropes that have been enduring the idea that black parents are right to fear that every time their child steps outdoors, uh, he'll be killed by a cop, which he said at the few guneral for the five Dallas police officers who were assassinated in cold blood in and Joe Biden has

picked up on that trope and uses it constantly himself. So, yes, that that was bad, but I think I think we would have been sort of here anyway, just given the left wing direction of our of our culture. Well and and and then even after the grand jury decided not to indict, you still had CNN personalities go on air with their hands up. You had St. Louis Rams players run onto the field gesturing hands up. Lawmakers going to the house floor pushing the lie, hands up, don't shoot.

So you know, again, it's like these facts, the facts don't matter when there's a narrative to be pushed over. Four dozen black children killed last year in their beds, on their front porches, at birthday parties, in their parents cars, in parks, barbecues. Is if there were four dozen white children killed in these mindless drive by shootings, there being national revolution. And yet, as I say, we're talking about the police, none of those kids were shot by the police.

Three children shot in the head in Minneapolis in May of this year alone, Two of them have died, one of the oldest of them a ten year old boy. There was a six year old girl who died almost immediately, a nine year old finally died after weeks of fighting. Ten year old boy is going to be a vegetable lot for life. Uh. You've had similar things in Chicago, more children killed this year than than ever before, and nobody wants to talk about it. The as I say, Lisa,

the country turns its eyes away. They're embarrassed. We are supposed to believe that we're a white supremacist country. That is ridiculous. We make excuses, we find we find scapegoats for this crime. That's not the behavior of a white supremacist country. This is a country that is ready to be post racial. It is not racist. You have the press for since the nineties has refused to give the race of suspects because it shows that violent street crime today is the face of violent street crime in the

US is black and brown, period. That's it. Drive by shootings. If you hear about a shooting at a house party, you you virtually know the race of the people involved. And that's because of family breakdown. It's because of a failure of socialization. There are solutions to that problem, but we don't want to and instead we are making cops the scapegoat for crimes. What are those solutions in your

eyes that we should focus on. Revalerizing fathers, throwing off the yoke of feminism that tells us that strong women can do it all and that men are toxically masculine and a volunteering sort of optional appendage to raising a child. No children, on average, they need both parent. Both biological parents bring complementary predilections skills to raising children. If nothing else, you've got twice the kin resources, You've got twice the economic resources there are. Of course, I always have to

put in this disclaimer. Of course, there are heroic single mothers that are doing a great job in raising children, but the odds are against them. And President Obama, when he was first running for president in two thousand and eight, gave a very good speech at the University of Chicago on Father's Day, actually giving the data of what we know about the likelihood of kids raised in single mother families becoming juvenile, delinquents, dropping out of school, ending up

in prison, having mental health problems. He acknowed, knowledged it, and then he immediately segued to well, the solution is more government services. No, that's not the solution. We have spent trillions in this country trying to close the racial academic achievement gap, the behavior gap. At this point, what is needed is a value change and a cultural change. It's the breakdown of the family is the most catastrophic

problem facing the United States today. And it's not just a question of sort of the the deficit that any individual child faces in not having both of his parents there, but it's also the loss of an entire culture of marriage.

When when young boys know that in order to have access to sexual favors over the long term, they need to develop bourgeois habits of self uh self control, deferred gratification, impulse control, future orientation that provides an incentive for them to rein in the sort of more uh barbaric aspects of male nous. I mean they are males are impulsive and aggressive. Marriage civilizes men and and and turns them

into productive members of society. When that breaks down, when it's the norm in a community that everybody's just gonna serially impregnate each other and and boys have no responsibility for the children that they have created. Uh, that is a very unstable situation that is not at all conducive

two lawful productive behavior. Now, I completely agree on the need for families and how you know, just focusing on the family is a solution to a lot of this and also just sets children up for for higher rate of success. M But you know, even at the Jacob Blaze Blake case, I think it's sort of telling in what some of these people and these activists actually want, which I think is to be able to act with

impunity and to not have any repercussions or consequences. Because you have an individual who had a felony warrant out for sexual assault because he had showed up at his ex girlfriend's house and the mother of his children, sexually assaulted her, stole her debit card and her car, shows up at the house again, tries to steal his keys, cops know this. Cops know that he had a felony

warrant out for his rest. He resists the police, he puts one at a headlock, resist being taste, has a knife in his hand, with children in the backseat, and then a shot. After all of this took place, Yet you still have candidates, or you still had then Joe Biden put out a statement claiming racism. You have the Governor of Wisconsin, Toni Evers, claiming racism, saying that Jacob Blake is not the first black man to have been shot, injured,

or worselessly killed at the hands of law enforcement. You have Kamala Harris meeting with his family. How do we end up in a society where Jacob Blake is the victim and not the woman in that situation. Lisa, I

just applaud you. Your absolutely right, Your your outrage and your your mystification are completely justified, and you are pointing out what is just a tragic facet of our world today, which is that our current civil rights heroes petically thugs because the way, the only the way to become a civil rights hero today is to be killed by a cop, and overwhelmingly you get killed by a cop by resisting arrest, and and likely you've been engaged in illegal behavior. And

so you have this whitewashing of these thugs. I mean, George Floyd was a thug. There's a video that I saw recently, a porn video with him in it. It's utterly disgusting. And and we've you're right, there's Floyd with his abuse of women, you know, with pistol whip ing. There's been you know, cast out on whether the woman was pregnant or not. But in any case, this was a bunch of males praying on a female, stealing her money. It happens again and again, and yet we're glorifying these people.

It is completely bizarre, and it I just keep bringing it back fact that we we cannot address, honestly the breakdown of civilizing norms in the black community, and and so instead are turning into role models. I mean, you know, you had you had Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton eulogizing. I think it was Blake saying he's the King of no This was Dante right saying he's the king of or the Prince of Minneapolis. Because I guess the singer

prince came from a similar area. Uh and, and Dante righting In was was a criminal, he had he had a outstanding felony warrant on him. And yet these are the people that we are turning into into heroes and martyrs. And and the language around George Floyd has been astounding. You know, somebody said during the media, uh one year anniversary, you know he's going to be remembered for generations to come. I mean, you know, one can one can say that

he should not have been held down that long. But there there's got to be other people within the black community that are worthy of reverence, that are are working hard, they're building institutions uh and and being a resisting arrest and and ending up the at the receiving end of force by the police be the main way that our culture honors black achievement. Well, and I know understand why we can't just have these conversations as we're having in in hodesty and point out the fact that you know,

George Floyd was no hero. He should not have resisted arrest. Simultaneously, the police should not have acted in the manner in which they did. It's like, it's like, why all these things can be true at once, and we can have an honest conversation about the fact that, you know, we shouldn't be idolizing, you know, this man with this terrible behavior on the back or in his past, well simultaneously saying that, you know, cops did not take the appropriate

actions in this case. Yeah, I don't know, Uh, I mean, I think people are Most people are in complete ignorance about what the crime rates are in the inner city because the press doesn't cover it. As I say, you know, I read the Chicago Tribue. In the Chicago Tribune does a very good, uh service, and it it pretty much does cover the daily shootings. But it's one of the few newspapers that do. And to read it every day is utterly mind boggling. What's going It's just every single

day there are people being shot. It's just part of routine life there and and the public has no clue. They have no clue about what's going on. But it's that rate a violent crime which brings police to those communities and which increases in officer's use of force. Again, of all victims of police shootings are black, that's twice as much as their population. Now, remember the benchmark problem.

That's why the Black Lives Matter movement says, well, there's twelve percent of the population in America is black black's makeup or so of fatal victim victims of fatal police shootings. Therefore, measured against that population benchmark, we have police racism. Again. Wrong benchmark. You've gotta men measured against I'm blacks commit about of murders and robberies in the large seventy five largest counties of the U. S which is where most

of the population resides. So when you measure police activity against crime, it is not disproportionate. But the public doesn't know that because the press does not cover those shootings. Let there be one white kid shot fatally and it's a national story. You know that things are national stories. But there's a Newton, Connecticut, you know, every few months cumulatively in the black community. Nobody knows that. All they

know are those handful of questionable police shootings. And some of them, as you say, Lisa, are not even questionable, like the the female knife attack. Uh. And yet you know, I've had some the left back down on that one, and I'm with view. I don't think they have I don't think that even when it became it was clear from the start that that was a She was the aggressor,

she was about to commit murder, the cop was. I've had cops marvel at his marksmanship skills of being able to, you know, defuse that threat without killing the other people around. And yet that I think with you, that that incident has been put in the category of racist police violence along with everything else. It's just as I say, I I my mouth hangs open every single day at how large the gap is between, as you say, the truth

and the narrative. I also think it's a sad reflection of our society that we've become so desensitized to so many people dying in so many inner cities across America. I mean, every life should matter. You're right, You're right. I mean, but I've said that someone times like black lives matter. I don't get it. Here's the numbers. You know, there's probably gonna be ten thousand blacks who were killed last year. At least, that will be more than all

all white and Hispanic victims combined, much much more. Even though blacks or twelve percent of the population. Those unarmed black victims that you talked about from the Washington Post database. You know, Washing Post defines unarmed extremely liberally to include people that are trying to grab the officers gun, which is putting the officer unnoticed that that person intends to kill you, or escaping in a stolen car with a loaded handgun in the seat next to you. You know,

people that are beating officers with their own equipment. Those counts unarmed. Those you know, maybe a dozen and a half every year. Uh, unarmed victims black victims make up about point one or point two are sent of all

black homicide victims. Uh. And yet this phony narrative, and it is based on people as just assume, well that's kind of the way they act, and uh, it's and you know what I find also strange and frustrating, Lisa, is I think it's kind of hard to get the American public generally to pay attention to this crime increase that's going on. The numbers are beyond belief. Every single city is seeing nearly triple digit increases in shootings and homicides.

And part of the reason why I think it's not getting the attention that it should is as as murky as the public is about the reality of inner city crime. They're making part of them. That sort of says, well, they kind of are dimly aware that, well, that's blacks that are killing each other. It's it's overwhelmingly black on black violence. Why should I here? And at some point that's a legitimate question. You know, if black politicians don't care,

why should anybody else care? And and so this crime increase that we're living through now is only going to start getting attention when white kids start getting killed. If white kids start getting gunned down in these mindless drive by shootings, then we will see changes in attitude towards the police. What we're seeing happening is the carjackings are spreading really terrifying instances, people being dragged, you know, beaten

killed by being dragged. With the carjackings, uh and and Washington, d C, Chicago, Philadelphia, it's it's spiraling out of control, that's going into suburban neighborhoods. You know, you have Chicago Alderman holding official times when you can fill your car at a gas station because there'll be a police presence there, because otherwise you don't know if somebody's going to come up and stick a gun to your head and drive

off with your car. So that crime is spreading. But but for now, uh, people don't really seem to care, and and they may just be following the the the direction of the black activists who don't care either about black lives and talk about too. I mean, we've seen an exodus of police officers from places like Minneapolis, people either you know, walking off the job or you know various things. Can you talk a little bit about that exodus we're saying across the country. Yeah, it's it's massive.

The recruiting is over. You cannot recruit now. Uh, nobody's coming into this job. So the defunding movement is kind of besides the point because even if departments wanted to bulk up, there's nobody applying. Understandably because as I mentioned earlier, police officers are telling their family the feeder sources, don't do it, it's not worth it. And people are taking early retirement, that going out on disability. And so you have departments now as we face the summer, uh, that

are strapped. They don't have the officers. So it's gonna be a very bad summer. And what I you know, we've been talking a lot about paradox is today Lisa and and phony narratives and bait and switches on the part of the the media. One of my favorites is that to the extent of the media has acknowledged the crime increase of and into Their favorite explanation was, well,

it's the pandemic. It's the lockdowns, uh, and the lockdowns are just making people so economically straightened that they're forced to go out and kill each other, you know, um, which is completely phony. These kids that are killing each other, it's not as if they were hard workers at McDonald's and now they've been thrown out of a job, and so because they've been thrown out of a job and they're struggling for subsistence, they're going out and shooting each

other on corners. No, these are kids that are simply not socialized. The police have backed off. They know they're not going to get stopped with the gun, and so it's the wild West out there. Why did the Why is the press embraced the pandemic narrative instead of the real one, which is deep policing. It's because the press refuses to acknowledge that police make a difference and that law enforcement the threat of the threat of being arrested.

The threat of being imprisoned actually does change behavior. And when you when you when you pull back on policing, you release the worst in human beings. So we've been hearing for the last year that, oh, the pandemic is leading to this crime increase. We knew that was fake from beginning because the only place where crime increased during

the lockdowns was in the United States. In other industrialized countries, crime went down, and here it only started going up after the George Floyd riots, and only with regards to drive by shootings and homicides. So every other country provides a counter uh refutation for that narrative. But now what the press is saying is that, well, yeah, maybe crime is going to get bad this summer because the lockdowns

are over. So the lockdowns create crime, and then when you let the lockdowns, they create crime um both ways, and and it is going to be very bad. With the lack of recruiting, the the demoralization, cops not getting out of their cars. They've gone completely passive, which is their prerogative. You know, the only thing that cops are obligated to do is to respond to nine one one calls.

They don't have to make those discretionary stops. They don't have to get out of their car at two am and question somebody out on a known drug corner hitching up his waistband as if he has a gun. They can drive on by and wait for that guy to actually shoot somebody and then respond when the radio call comes from nine one one that somebody's been shot. And that's what they're doing because they're saying, why should I risk a a cell phone video going I rolled that

shows me using force against a resisting suspect. I'm not going to do do as little as possible. And and they've gotten the political message that they should because they're told that it's racist to engage in proactive policing and minority communities, well, they're responding that message appropriately. So this is going to be very bad. And and I don't think that the crime is going to stay within the

inner city. People are leaving UH cities. There's white flight going on, the black middle class that can leave or leaving UH and and unless we turn this around, it's going to be very bad for the country. When we're saying that come to a head in places like Atlanta with the Buckhead community, you know, even wanting to separate themselves from the City of Atlanta and wanting their own police force. And you know, a movement going on there

as well right now. But has it has it gotten so bad to the point that even the left is waking up? Because what I find interesting is if you look at the New York City mayoral ray us on the left, you have some of the top contenders openly admitting, you know, the the uh crime problem that the City of New York is having. And I believe it was Andrew Yang even calling for, you know, expanding the NYPD if my memory serves me correct, at one of the

more recent debates. So has it gotten so bad that even the left have to admit the problem that we're facing as a society. Uh? Somewhat not really. Yeah, you have Eric Adams, who's a former police officer. I'm not a big fan of him, is sort of the front runner. Uh. He was a real racial rabble rouser as a police officer. He gave false testimony against police Commissioner Ray Kelly, who was Michael Bloomberg's police commissioner. Uh. And it's got a

very bad history of racial demagoguery. Nevertheless, he's the closest thing the city has to a law and order candidate in New York right now, and a lot of conservative institutions like The New York Post have you know, very vigorously endorsed him. And Andrew Yang, as you say, Lisa also has spoken about the need for stronger policing, but the rest of the candidates not very much. Um. And

I don't really see it happening in other cities. I mean, you have had reverse about faces with regards to defunding. You know, Minneapolis never did it, and and uh, the the wretched Jacob Fry there is is trying to get more money sort of kind of for marginal police activity. Um. But I don't think the country is ready for a true acknowledgement of how how dangerous this false narrative has been.

Because the left the real engine of of leftist ideology, which is the university's Uh, they are unbowed, and uh they continue to brainwash their students, who then go out into the world and populate the New York Times and and uh, you know, the Washington Post and CNN and MSNBC and corporations uh that are now committed to the idea that the only allowable explanation for ongoing socio economic disparities is white racism. You're not allowed to talk about

behavior or the academic skills gap. How much culpability does the Black Lives Matter movement having all of this huge Uh? You know, as I said, this was happening before the official Black Lives Matter movement you had in the nineties. Uh. And you know, anti police kneed your reaction has been

an aspect of the left for a very long time. Uh. But you're right that the Michael Brown shooting in Ferguson, Missouri was the real uh explosion that that started this thing going based on a falsehood, as you say, one that was a falsehood disproven by even the Obama Justice Department, that had no effect on the endurance of that hands up, don't shoot myth. I mean literally, that was literally a lie,

and yet people are still are still chanting it. And so obviously Black Lives Matter has been effective to that extent of making this idea that we're living through an epidemic of racially biased police violence be just received wisdom that one may not challenge more with Heather McDonald after this we talked about George Floyd a little bit um and you know you've previously said in an opinion piece that you know, Minneapolis officers who arrested George Floyd must

be held accountable. He did end up being found guilty of second degree third degree. Uh, you know, he ended up being found guilty. Do you think the charges he received were fair? Well, it's the charges are questionable. The real problem is the process of the trial. As I understand it, the third degree charge was was somewhat of a bootstrap affair. It's traditionally kind of used for felony

murder with group participation. Um, that wouldn't have applied really to Derek Chauvin, but they got him on second degree anyway. What I was most troubled by was the refusal to change the venue, the city's awarding of the twenty seven million settlement to the Floyd family right as the trial started. The refusal to sequester them. Now that's a that's a tough call for a judge, you know, after the um Dante right case in in Brooklyn Heights outside of Minneapolis.

It's a tough call because sequestration is very tough on a jury. But there's no question that they were that. I'm sure that jury was being pounded with the idea that we're living through in in continuing riots, and then the threat of riots was just huge. You know, there's a writer, Fred Siegel, who wrote a book that um called The Future Once Happened Here, and he talks about the right ideology, and that's the idea that you know, black rage is kind of a legitimate reason to arson

and loot and and and tear down cities. And the threat of black rage is always there. And that jury having lived through a year of Minneapolis Star Tribune coverage which just wanted a Pulitzer for its completely deceptive coverage of policing in Minneapolis. Uh, it would be very hard for that jury two not fear that if they acquitted on any of those counts, that the firestorm that would have hit every single American city was not on their hands.

I mean, that is the threat. Let's be honest. Any time now a police officer is on trial for uh, any kind of lethal interaction with a black man, we all know that if that officers acquitted, America burns to the ground. So how you have a fair trona maybe you know this was the right result, but we don't.

We don't know because it happened in a very very difficult situation, and every officer is terrified at this point that if he's compelled to use lethal force, he has no hope of a fair trial because he will be convicted, and as I say, the threat of black violence will hang over that trial and over that jury. And just for the sake of clarity, I just want to make

sure I get this right for the audience. Derek Chauvin was convicted of second degree murder, third degree murder, and second degree manslaughter, just to make sure you know, I have it clear for folks. And you also had President Biden weighing and the mayor of Minneapolis weighing. And that's where I was disturbed by all this, because I think you can watch the video and you can say, Okay, you know, it looks like there's wrongdoing that took place.

But also, we live in a society where officer Derek Chauvin, even if he was wrong, deserves a fair trial and also deserves to be fairly charged as well. And I think it sort of taints that perspective when you have the President of the United States weighing, And when you have the mayor weighing, and we have all this public pressure added to the jury, I find that a little bit disturbing. No, you're absolutely rightly, so, absolutely. I mean, the most precious thing that any civilization has is the

possibility of a neutral, impartial tribunal and fact finder. We all yearn for the to be confident that if we come before a tribunal of justice, we will be able to have our facts evaluated with impartiality. And when you lose that, when you fear that you can't get a fair here, and you can't get a fair trial, there is nothing you can turn to. You are then at

the mercy of tyranny. Uh. And as far as the charges, you know, the issue always is is intent uh And and with the second degree, as I understand it, the intent element gets to committing assault, not necessarily murder. UM. But you know, did did Chauvin really intend to assault, uh assault Floyd in that way? Or was he acting in misguided good faith? I don't know. UM. I have not focused on the legal minut shy of this, uh, but it is true you know that by and large,

the difference between officer behavior and criminal behavior. His officers are not setting out to kill somebody, whereas criminals are. Uh So coming up with an intent element can be kind of difficult, But I just think it's much healthier as a society to look at each of these cases on an individual basis and really examine the facts. And unfortunately we see this distortion, this effort by the meeting

and Left, as we've discussed throughout the show. Uh this desire to prove a narrative instead of look at the facts. And you know, it's it's obviously all very disturbing. But you know, before I let you go, right now, Congress, you know they're having conversations about police reform. I'm hesitant about it because I just think a lot of these conversations or be based off of a false narrative in the country that simply isn't true, that has been disproven

throughout the entirety of this conversation. But what do you make of Congress's efforts right now as they look at you know, quote unquote police reform. Well, you're right, that is exactly my objection to is that we're the whole exercise is premised on the idea that the police are the problem in this country. They're not the problem. Crime is the problem. We have a crime problem. Our crime

problem is unlike anything else in the West. Our rates of gun violence are forty times higher in certain age brackets than in Western countries, Japan, Germany. I mean, it's just it's off the church. There's nothing like it in the civilized world today. Uh. And police are response to that. If you want, if you want less police in your community, here's what you gotta do. Guys, commit less crime. You

know that, that's why they're there. And and and unless you want to just deal with it yourself, which is what Black Lives Matter claims they want to in my view as the police should say, fine, you know you want to take care of emotionally just a person calls or homeless calls or whatever, be my guest. You know, we're out of here. I'm amazed that they sort of

want to hold onto those responsibilities. But if you think you can do this better, let's have a try, you know, Al Sharpton, how about you try and deal with Central and East Harlem. Let's let's show us how you do it better than the police. So the the police reformed thing in Congress is based on a complete misrepresentation. It

seems to be sort of UH losing steam. Everybody was all united on the idea that white supremacy was the defining feature of the United States after George Floyd uh and and now there's people that are sort of quietly creeping away from that idea. UM So, as far as the details of it qualified immunity, it's a complicated issue, but arguably it is a valid UH doctrine because it says that the police should not be held responsible for areas of the law that are murky or truly good

faith mistakes. UM. But I'm I'm more concerned as you sort of imply, Lisa, it's not so much the details of of the law, because frankly, policing is local, and I think that most actions go on and and policies go on a local basis. The real problem is just the narrative, UH in the name of which the reform movement is going on. And that's that's the thing that is really impeding policing. It's not this or that ban

on choke holds or not. It's the it's the idea that the police are racist for going where crime is. And I've been saying on TV it's one of the most deadly lies that have ever been told, and it's having real world consequences on the very people that groups like the Black Lives Matter purport to care about. So obviously they don't. And it's disturbing and it's sad, and we should care about lives in America, and it's unfortunate we've become so desensitized to it. I think that's a disgrace.

Heather McDonald, this has been absolutely fascinating. I I so appreciate the time you've taken on my podcast, and thank you so much for being with me. Thank you so much for having me on. It's a great conversation, great questions. I want to thank Heather McDonald again for an incredible interview in getting the bottom of an issue that I think is one of the most deadliest lies that's being told in America today. And I want to thank you

all at home for listening. If you enjoyed today's show, please leave us review and rate us five stars and Apple podcast. It means so much to me when you take the time to go and leave reviews or ratings, so please do that. I would greatly appreciate it. You can also find me on Twitter and Instagram and at least some rebooth let me know there too. Are you

enjoying the show? What can we do different? And I just want to thank our team or producer John Cassio, writer Aaron Kleegman, researcher Margaret Smith, and our executive producers Debbie Myers and speaker New Gingridge. We're all part of the Gingridge three sixty network and team