Over the weekend, CNN host Jim Acosta joined his Democrat congressional guest in being dismissive of the need to actually lock up criminals who commit serious offenses as the two fretted over Fox News's insightful criticisms of President Joe Biden's failure to call out his party's soft-on-crime policies.
Ironically, just days earlier, CNN law enforcement analyst Andrew MCCabe -- a Democrat -- admitted that the Biden administration should do more to enforce current gun laws.
Speaking with New York Congressman Ritchie Torres on Saturday, Acosta asked about the possibility of a renewed push to pass new federal gun laws, leading Torres to blame Southern states for criminals using guns in New York. Acosta then followed up by playing a clip of Fox & Friends co-host Brian Kilmeade from Friday morning:
I would just think that Mark Penn, Democratic strategist, looks ate these numbers -- a guy like James Carville would look at President Biden and just say, "Hey, to solve this, you can't just mention guns. If you actually want to get some votes -- if you want to reverse the momentum" that's going against their party--
Then there was an editing jump, and Fox co-host Steve Doocy was seen complaining about President Biden's comments on crime as the President was in New York on Thursday. Here's Doocy: "The message should have been, 'I'm Joe Biden, and I've come to New York to make things safe, and we're going to start throwing the book at people who break the law.' He didn't say that yesterday."
Right after the point where Kilmeade's comments were cut off, the Fox News host had pointed out that there had been an increase in a number of crimes that criminals often commit without guns. Without that context, Acosta seemed worried Fox would undermine the liberal agenda of Democrats as he posed: "What's your reaction to that? Because, as you know, when they say things on Fox, then your Republican colleagues in the House start saying the same thing. So what's your reaction to that?"
Congressman Torres received no pushback as he preposterously claimed that "there's no evidence that overpolicing leads to greater public safety" in spite of the fact that crime dropped for 20 years in New York as there was a turn toward strict policing. On Thursday afternoon, even Andrew McCabe admitted there needed to be more enforcement of laws:
But what I'd like to see more of, Ana (Cabrera), is just a basic commitment to prosecuting people at the federal level for simple gun offenses like possession of a firearm by a felon. Those sorts of things come in the door every day at the state and local level, but often our state-level partners don't have the resources to really ensure that anyone who carries a gun with the intent to commit a crime does jail time. There's absolutely no reason why that should be the case, and the federal government can help out a lot in that way if they put prosecutors on that task.
McCabe went on the lean left on the rest of his analysis as he blamed an increase in gun sales for more shootings since 2020 when, in fact, the increase in gun sales would have been a reaction to the increase in crime that occurred after media coverage of the George Floyd case.
The liberal spin to cover for Democrats over the weekend was sponsored in part by the Farmer's Dog. Their contact information is linked.
Transcripts follow:
CNN Newsroom
February 3, 2022
1:51 p.m. Eastern
ANDREW McCABE, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: The second thing is the steps he is proposing to take -- some of them, I think, will have a direct effect on this wave of gun violence, you know, targeting interstate trafficking of handguns is a good thing. But what I'd like to see more of, Ana, is just a basic commitment to prosecuting people at the federal level for simple gun offenses like possession of a firearm by a felon. Those sorts of things come in the door every day at the state and local level, but often our state-level partners don't have the resources to really ensure that anyone who carries a gun with the intent to commit a crime does jail time. There's absolutely no reason why that should be the case, and the federal government can help out a lot in that way if they put prosecutors on that task.
ANA CABRERA: It is obviously going to be a huge team effort, community effort and more. I do want to emphasize some of the stats that you brought up. In 2021, 10 of the most populous U.S. cities set homicide records according to a CNN analysis of police data. And that followed a 2020 nationwide increase of murders that the CDC says was the largest for a single year in more than a century. Andrew why do you think violent crime is on the rise?
McCABE: Well, Ana, look, we've got to call out the elephant in the room, and that is the number of guns that continue to flood across this country. So I was looking at some numbers just before we came on, we see increases of a few million background checks if you look at the FBI's NIX division that conducts the background checks for firearms sales. In 2019 -- I'm sorry, 2018 -- there were over 26 million background checks that year -- and there's one background check for each permit application on gun sale. In 2019, the number went up to 28 million. And then, from 2019 to 2020, the number of NIX checks went from 28 million to 39 million background checks just in that one year. So that wave -- that wave and infusion of guns onto the streets, into people's homes, into people's hands -- has an inextricable effect on violent crime, and we're seeing the results of that right now.
(...)
Fox & Friends
February 4, 2022
6:07 a.m. Eastern
BRIAN KILMEADE: Tucker Carlson weighed in last night, and he says we're just not addressing the problem, which means nothing's going to get solved.
TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NEWS HOST: Keep in mind, in New York City, Biden-endorsed politicians have stopped enforcing a lot of the gun laws. Stop-and-frisk -- remember that? That was against the equity agenda -- you can't have that. So people with illegal guns are getting away, and, by the way, Joe Biden's own son violated federal firearms laws. He broke gun laws -- a felony. He was not prosecuted. But you can't have a gun in your home because "no amendment is absolute." (editing jump) The bottom line is, the guns aren't being enforced. That's really the problem.
AINSLEY EARHARDT: Our new D.A. will not even put you behind bars -- if you walk in and you rob a store with a gun, you will only get in trouble -- you only go behind bars if you fire that weapon. That is ridiculous. It's crazy. These cops are saying, "Follow these people who are firing the guns -- these criminals who have these illegal guns in their house -- they don't go off on their own -- someone is actually pulling the trigger. And if you let them stay out on the streets and walk around with these guns -- as long as they're not firing them and you don't put up high bars, we're going to continuously have these problems.
(...)
KILMEADE: I would just think that Mark Penn, Democratic strategist, looks ate these numbers -- a guy like James Carville would look at President Biden and just say, "Hey, to solve this, you can't just mention guns. If you actually want to get some votes -- if you want to reverse the momentum" that's going against their party, you should look at the stats. Robbery up 33 percent, rape up 27 percent, felony assault 12 percent, grand larceny up 58 percent in January. You can't just blame the guns.
EARHARDT: Did you hear what the mom said? Remember we did the story of the mom. She was in the car with her child -- her husband went into the grocery store. She was interviewed about this, and she said, "I don't care if you fill up Riker's Island -- isn't that what a jail is for -- what a prison is for? Fill it up with the criminals."
(...)
CNN Newsroom
February 5, 2022
4:41 p.m. Eastern
JIM ACOSTA: The proposals that you're talking about and the administration is talking about include new initiatives by the Justice department aimed at combating the ghost guns, drug-related violence, and so on. What do you make of these plans? Do they go far enough? And what about bringing back to the table and trying to get going in Congress to pass new gun safety legislation -- background checks, that sort of thing?
CONGRESSMAN RITCHIE TORRES (D-NY): Well, here in New York City, Mayor Adams is making every effort to crush the epidemic of gun violence, but there's a limit to what he can do locally. There's no substitute for federal action. Most of the guns that are recovered in New York City crime scenes are coming from the South -- are going through the iron pipeline. It extends from the South to the Northeast, so the federal government has to play a much more aggressive role in dismantling of the iron pipeline which has led to an explosion of guns on the streets of New York. But one of the biggest challenges that we face to public safety is Republican obstructionism against gun safety.
ACOSTA: And you said that the "defund the police" movement in New York city and good riddance. A lot of people -- their eyebrows went up when you said that. But I think a lot of Democrats agree with you -- a lot of American agree with you explain why you said that.
(TORRES)
(...)
And here's how Fox's morning show covered the President's visit to New York and his message there. Let's watch.
BRIAN KILMEADE, FOX NEWS HOST: I would just think that Mark Penn, Democratic strategist, looks ate these numbers -- a guy like James Carville would look at President Biden and just say, "Hey, to solve this, you can't just mention guns. If you actually want to get some votes -- if you want to reverse the momentum" that's going against their party--
(editing jump)
STEVE DOOCY, FOX NEWS HOST: The message should have been, "I'm Joe Biden, and I've come to New York to make things safe, and we're going to start throwing the book at people who break the law." He didn't say that yesterday.
ACOSTA: What's your reaction to that? Because, as you know, when they say things on Fox, then your Republican colleagues in the House start saying the same thing. So what's your reaction to that?
CONGRESSMAN TORRES: Fox News is living in an alternate reality. There would be no gun violence without guns. It's disingenuous for Republicans to cling to the "tough on crime." If you're soft on guns, you're soft on violent crime because guns are the deadliest type of violence in America. The leading cause of death among teenagers, and there's no evidence that overpolicing leads to greater public safety. From 2011 to 2017, here in New York City, we went from 700,000 stops to a mere 1,200 stops, and, over that same period of time, we saw a decline in the murder rate by 50 percent. So what we need is not aggressive, abusive policing -- what we need is precision policing combined with reinvestments in underserved communities.
