After the Minneapolis City Council voted to disband the police department and replace it with a new “public safety model,” the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms has advised residents and especially Minneapolis business people to arm themselves.
This move comes after it was revealed that the city is spending thousands of dollars providing private security for three council members. So far, published reports say the city has spent at least $63,000 on this security to protect council members Andrea Jenkins, Alondra Cano and Phillipe Cunningham. All three have been outspoken about disbanding the police department in the wake of the death of George Floyd, a black man, while under restraint by Minneapolis police officers.
“What’s happening in Minneapolis is a reprehensible act of hypocrisy,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb. “While council members are planning a lengthy process of developing what they call a ‘new public safety model,’ what are the citizens supposed to do? They’re not getting private security protection. That’s apparently a perk only for three council members who claim to have received threats since the killing of George Floyd last month.
“Even more ironic,” he continued, “is that the council members have been outspoken about defunding their city’s police department. The police department is reportedly not providing security services because those resources are needed in the community.
“It’s time for Minneapolis business people and private citizens to arm themselves,” Gottlieb said, “because the city certainly won’t pay for their private security. It’s the common sense response to a city council that appears to have lost perspective, if not their collective minds.”
He described Floyd’s death as “a tragedy,” but criticized the effort to defund and disband the police department as “overkill.”
“People should put their personal safety, and the safety of their families, first,” Gottlieb said. “What they should not do is allow the city council to con them into being guinea pigs for some Utopian social reform effort. Buy a gun, learn to use it safely and competently, seek competent instruction and practice safe storage.
“Maybe members of the Minneapolis City Council should do likewise,” he concluded. “After all, it would be far less a burden on taxpayers than the $4,500 a day the city is reportedly paying for the security details.”
