"Got robbed. Again," tweeted CNN reporter Kyung Lah, who, along with a colleague, was at the San Francisco city hall on March 17 for an interview. She posted a photo of the smashed back window of their rental car, which they had even hired a security guard to watch. The incident happened in a matter of seconds, she explained, leaving her with no form of identification for her flight back to Los Angeles. The reason the journalists were there in the first place was to cover "voter discontent bc of rampant street crime"—an irony not lost on her.
"If you do visit this city, know that even with hired security watching your car, it is not enough," she warned—something residents struggle with daily.
San Francisco District Supervisor Hillary Ronen would agree and has been calling for more resources for her crime-plagued community.
"I've been begging this department to give the Mission [District] what it deserves in terms of police presence all year long," Ronen said during a Budget and Appropriations Committee meeting last week, according to Fox News. "And I have been told time and time and time and time again there are no officers that we can send to Mission."
The Democrat added, "It hurts. And I feel betrayed by the department. I feel betrayed by the mayor. I feel betrayed by the priorities of the city."
But what neither talked about is the reason for the crime in the first place. Could it have something to do with policy or the politicians Californians elected?
"You get the government you vote for!" one Twitter user responded to Lah.
What about Ronen? Here was her take in 2020 after the George Floyd protests.
"I want to make it clear that I believe strongly in defunding the police and reducing the number of officers on our force," she tweeted. "For decades we've had an imbalance in our city's budget, with hundreds of millions of dollars going to SFPD to have them do work they are not qualified to do."
sf district supervisor @hillaryronen of “defund the police” fame, emotionally berating the sf chief of police for … not having enough police in her district.
— Siqi Chen (@blader) March 17, 2023
no words.pic.twitter.com/k9tmbmel6s
While she finally gets it, San Francisco Mayor London Breed got the clue much sooner. After cutting $120 million from the city's police and sheriff's departments in 2020, she did a 180 the following year, making an emergency request to the Board of Supervisors to support law enforcement cracking down on rampant crime, open-air drug dealing, retail theft, and more.
But as long as the same people are in place, the same problems will persist, which is a lesson that seems to be lost on California liberals.