House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Wednesday appeared clueless as to why retail theft has been on the rise in some cities across the nation, including San Francisco, the district she represents.
The California Democrat was asked about the smash-and-grab attacks, which have even hit high-end retailers like Nordstrom and Louis Vuitton.
"It's absolutely outrageous. Obviously it cannot continue," she said. “But the fact is that there is an attitude of lawlessness in our country that springs from I don’t know where, maybe you do, but we cannot have that lawlessness.”
“None of it is acceptable,” she added. “It has to be stopped.”
The White House has also spoken out against the rising crime, though not all Democrats agree.
“We have seen some of these extremely disturbing videos showing retail theft,” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said. “State and local leaders like Gov. Gavin Newsom have identified this as a serious concern. We agree.”
Meanwhile, progressive Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has doubted the crime wave.
"A lot of these allegations of organized retail theft are not actually panning out," Ocasio-Cortez recently told the Washington Times.
According to the Times, over $1 billion in merchandise was stolen from Bay Area stores last month alone. Citing the devastating impact of “organized” shoplifting, Walgreens announced in October that five additional stores in San Francisco would be closing.
"These people coordinate with each other and they plan traffic patterns and the rest so they can reach their goal and depart very quickly," Pelosi said of the organized thefts. "This isn't like somebody stealing something to go home because they don't have money to buy. This is about stealing for profit."
Pelosi spoke about an upcoming bill that would help address the part of the problem.
"Within that bill, the Energy and Commerce Committee has something called INFORM… legislation that would require those who are selling online especially is to establish their legitimacy as to where these products came from. Because what people do is they steal things and they sell them online," Pelosi said.
"The Judiciary Committee has a bill, Save Shopping, which addresses the same problem in a different way in terms of holding platforms accountable and those selling things accountable for the prominence of those goods," she continued. "[It’s] out of the question that people should be able to think that they can just steal things, profit from them and not have accountability."
Pelosi ought to consider the soft-on-crime policies places most affected by these crime surges have embraced, like defunding the police, bail reform, and Prop 47 in California, which treats the theft of merchandise worth $950 or less as a misdemeanor.
Speaker Pelosi should look in the mirror to see what caused the ‘attitude of lawlessness’ spreading across the country.
— Kevin McCarthy (@GOPLeader) December 15, 2021
Democrat politicians defunded police, raised money for rioters, and pushed policies that are soft on crime. They own this crime wave.
pic.twitter.com/g8D7vh4U3D
Join the conversation as a VIP Member