——

As my RedState colleague Nick Arama reported Sunday, a “veto-proof majority” of Minneapolis City Council members have indicated they are on board with disbanding the police in their city just days after rioters and looters in Minneapolis unleashed chaos and hell in the aftermath of the death of George Floyd.

Floyd died in police custody on May 25th after (former) Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin had his knee on Floyd’s neck for nearly 9 minutes, according to the criminal complaint filed against Chauvin. For nearly three of those minutes, Floyd became unresponsive.

One of the Minneapolis City Council members on board with dismantling the police force is city council president Lisa Bender, who was interviewed Monday morning by CNN’s Alysin Camerota.

The “New Day” co-host asked a question a lot of Americans have for people like Bender who advocate for some variation of defunding/disbanding/dismantling of local police forces in the name of social justice. Who is a person to call in the middle of the night when their home is broken into if there is no police department?

Bender’s answer was like a gift to President Trump:

“Yes, I mean, I hear that loud and clear from a lot of my neighbors,” she explained. “And I know ⁠— and myself, too, and I know that that comes from a place of privilege. Because for those of us for whom the system is working, I think we need to step back and imagine what it would feel like to already live in that reality where calling the police may mean more harm is done.”

Watch:

CAMEROTA: "What if in the middle of the night my home is broken into. Who do I call?"

BENDER: "Yes, I hear that loud and clear from a lot of my neighbors. And I know — and myself, too, and I know that that comes from a place of privilege." pic.twitter.com/WhubQ9yJIf

— Eddie Zipperer (@EddieZipperer) June 8, 2020

I can’t think of a worse answer this woman could have given to the question. That’s even taking into consideration that she didn’t really answer what Camerota actually asked – probably because from the perspective of a defund the police advocate there is no good answer to to give to people legitimately concerned about the possibility they can’t call the police when they feel they are in danger.

Over the weekend, I talked to Twitter friends who correctly pointed out that the left has the uncanny ability to always overplay their hand on these matters – taking a pure movement based on legitimate outrage and trying to pull it as far left as they can without considering the fact that the vast majority of people in America will not be on board with it, and may ultimately end up expressing that disagreement in a big way via the ballot box.

Being able to call the police doesn’t come from a “place of privilege.” It’s something people of all colors should be able to do when they feel in danger or threatened. To the extent that members of the black community feel as though they can be put in danger themselves by calling the police, yes, let’s put some reforms in place so they can feel safer when they make that call.

Defunding/disbanding police is not the answer, though.