An easy way to doom your city is to pay 1,380 rioters $9,950 each, which is precisely what Democrat-run New York City is doing.
Before we go any further, police officers can and do go too far. I am not a knee-jerk “Back the Blue” guy. Never have been. When cops go too far, there should be accountability. This insane payoff has nothing to do with accountability. New York Democrats are settling a class-action suit. That is pure madness and a perfect way to ensure rioters riot while police officers stand by and do nothing, knowing the city will hang them out to dry at every opportunity.
Protesters in Brooklyn, New York, jump on an NYPD police SUV during a demonstration against the killing of George Floyd (BRYAN R. SMITH/AFP via Getty Images).
If 1,380 rioters believe their civil rights were violated during the George Floyd 1619 Riots, then each one should be required to file an individual lawsuit and make their case. To pay off 1,380 indiscriminately is insane, a way to tell rioters that rioting pays—and pays well…
Mayor Bill de Blasio instituted a curfew, the city’s first in 75 years. As the looting waned, police officers dispersed or arrested people who were marching outside the prescribed hours. According to the New York State attorney general’s office, the police made just over 2,000 protest-related arrests between May 28 and June 7, 2020.
New York Times journalists covering the protests saw officers repeatedly charge at protesters out after curfew with little apparent provocation, shoving people onto sidewalks and striking them with batons.
Some of the people who stand to receive payments under the class-action settlement were arrested. Others were not taken into custody but, the suit asserted, were subject to police conduct meant to impede and deter their ability to exercise First Amendment rights.
The far-left New York Times paints a distorted and undoubtedly manipulated picture of police officers out of control…
“One video clip, recorded in Brooklyn, showed two police SUVs ramming a crowd of people standing in a street.”
“One video from outside Barclays Center in Brooklyn on May 29, 2020, shows several police officers, including a commander, aiming overhand baton blows at a figure on the ground.”
“Another video shows a group of officers following protesters down a sidewalk in East Flatbush on May 30 and knocking some to the pavement.”
“Pepper spray.” “Wielding batons.” Shoving.”
Okay, but where’s the context?
Have these police officers been suspended or fired? If what they did was as bad as the Times wants to make it look and these actions are caught on videotape, where’s the accountability?
It appears that the only people being held accountable are the same taxpayers who saw their city ravaged, looted, and burned… who lost their city to savages as their insurance rates skyrocketed.
People loot a store during demonstrations over the death of George Floyd (BRYAN R. SMITH/AFP via Getty Images).
The obvious goal here is to encourage rioting. Democrats love the power that chaos, despair, and ruin offer. Paying $10,000 to rioters who, at best, refused a lawful order to disburse and, at worst, were engaged in outright criminality is a brilliant way to bring more ruin into your city.
Be happy, New Yorkers… You’re getting exactly what you voted for. Everyone should get what they want, and the more you morons get, the happier I am.
If you need me, I’ll be over here getting what I voted for.
Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC. Follow his Facebook Page here.