After Botching Parkland, Sheriff Israel Issues Unbelievable Demand
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If Sheriff Scott Israel refused to take responsibility for his botched job at preventing the Parkland high school shooting, that would be bad.
If he used the shooting as an opportunity to push his own leftist demands, that would be even worse.
He’s done both.
“You never want a serious crisis to go to waste,” former President Obama adviser and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel once said.
Israel has taken that advice to heart if his response to the Parkland shooting is any indication.
First, he has denied responsibility.
Since the school massacre on Feb. 14, Israel has consistently refused to take any fault for the role his lack of leadership played in failing to prevent the shooting.
“Do you think if the Broward Sheriff’s Office had done things differently, this shooting might not have happened?” asked CNN’s Jake Tapper.
Israel’s reply was mind-boggling.
“Listen, if ifs and buts were candy and nuts, O.J. Simpson would still be in the record books,” he replied.
Seventeen people are dead, it’s glaringly clear the sheriff’s department massively failed, and Israel’s speaking complete nonsense.
He even had the gall to say that his leadership of the department has been “amazing.”
Second, Israel has shifted the blame.
A week after the shooting, Israel joined CNN’s town hall to sanctimoniously bash law-abiding gun owners and the NRA.
Israel should’ve been on his hands and knees begging for forgiveness for the catastrophic errors made under his leadership. Instead, he pointed fingers.
As Stoneman Douglas student Kyle Kashuv told Fox News, “It absolutely outrages me that on the CNN town hall, we had the sheriff who was virtue signaling against the NRA and against guns when he didn’t even act properly. The armed officer at our school waited outside and then the sheriff and his men for four minutes let my classmates die while they sat outside and waited … he didn’t even do his job properly and then he turns around and says guns are the issue.”
https://twitter.com/Chet_Cannon/status/967822549831770112
There was nothing the NRA could’ve done to prevent the shooting. There was nothing law-abiding gun owners could’ve done to prevent the shooting.
Who actually could’ve done something? Sheriff Israel and the Broward County Sherrif’s Office.
Nikolas Cruz had a history of violent and erratic behavior that was reported to the sheriff’s office dozens of times over a span of at least two years, and they did absolutely nothing.
As if that wasn’t enough, multiple sheriff’s deputies waited outside as shots and screams rang out inside the school.
Finally, Israel is using the shooting to make unbelievable demands, pushing as many leftist agendas as he can: increased federal spending, gun control and more power in the hands of the government.
“This isn’t the time to worry about how many dollars might be saved if we don’t have a deputy here or a police officer there,” Israel told lawmakers at the Florida capitol, according to NBC News.
It’s a classic leftist position: throw more money at the problem and hope something changes. Horrific policies and incompetence within the sheriff’s department and the school district are the reasons this shooting wasn’t prevented, not a lack of funds.
“What I’m asking our lawmakers to do … give police the power if they see something on social media … we need to have the power to take that person and bring them before mental health professionals, involuntarily,” he continued.
Ah, I see now. The government and the sheriff’s office needs more power. Not courage to confront the shooter, not commonsense to follow up on tips that Cruz was a violent threat — they just need more power over citizens in their jurisdiction.
Various people did notice the disturbing things Cruz posted on social media and told law enforcement. And the sheriff’s department did nothing. But we need to give these incompetent failures more power?
The same applies to the sheriff’s push for gun control.
As Conservative Tribune reported Wednesday, “From the federal FBI down to the local sheriff’s deputies, the government failed at every level in Parkland. Yet suddenly we want these same incompetent fools to be the ones determining — single-handedly and with no court involvement, it seems — when the Second Amendment applies and when to ignore it?”
Watch Israel’s full address below:
It’s hard to overstate the outrage that should be directed at the Sheriff Israel and his department’s failures leading up the shooting. His response has only made it worse.
Share this story on Facebook if you’re outraged by Sheriff Israel’s blame-shifiting, agenda-pushing response to the Parkland shooting.
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