On Tuesday’s broadcast of “CNN This Morning,” D.C. City Councilwoman Christina Henderson (I) stated that there are “a lot of vacancies” on the city’s police force “But we have not cut those positions. And we’re certainly needing to do more work in terms of recruitment and retention of our officers. But the National Guard is not law enforcement.” And filling vacancies on the Superior Court is a better deterrent than “thousands of police officers and the National Guard on our streets.”
Henderson said, “Well, we have over 3,100 sworn officers. And, yes, the union leader is correct, we do have a lot of vacancies. But we have not cut those positions. And we’re certainly needing to do more work in terms of recruitment and retention of our officers. But the National Guard is not law enforcement. The National Guard is designed to help communities with disasters, logistics, large events. And so, it’s always going to be disconcerting when we have military basically guarding the streets of an American city and their own residents.”
She added, “[W]hen I hear from our federal partners that we need to do more on crime, I also want to say to them, I need you to do more on crime. I have a 21% vacancy in my D.C. Superior Court. That’s criminal, family, juvenile, all of these cases. And when you don’t have swift justice, I believe that is a bigger deterrent than having thousands of police officers and the National Guard on our streets.”
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