President Trump's recent visit to Kenosha, Wisconsin clearly underlines the fact that the president always has been, and always will be, the biggest supporter of public safety, the rule of law and America's brave law enforcement officers.
That is in stark contrast to the twisted narrative that former Vice President Joe Biden and his Democrat comrades are trying to push as they emptily attempt to blame the president for radical, left-wing riots around the country.
The purpose of President Trump's visit was to reassure the shell-shocked people of riot-ravaged Kenosha, and to ensure that the federal government continues doing everything possible to help the city recover. As the president pointed out during his roundtable discussion with police officers and local business owners, the violent mobs destroyed at least 25 local businesses, burned down public buildings and assaulted the police. If not for the president's decision to deploy the National Guard, the city might still be consumed by violence to this very day.
"If I didn't INSIST on having the National Guard activate and go into Kenosha, Wisconsin, there would be no Kenosha right now," the president tweeted ahead of his visit, adding that there "would have been great death and injury" if not for the actions of the federal government.
During his trip to Kenosha, President Trump also thanked local law enforcement for their role in putting an end to the riots, and underscored the effectiveness of the National Guard in fighting domestic terrorism in local communities.
"My administration coordinated with the state and local authorities, to very-very swiftly deploy the National Guard...to Kenosha and stop the violence," he said, stressing that the White House will continue using the National Guard to uphold the rule of law across America.
Of course, the Trump administration is interested in more than just helping Kenosha restore order—it is also committed to helping the city rebuild in the aftermath of the destruction. In fact, President Trump announced that the federal government would be providing $1 million to the Kenosha law enforcement, nearly $4 million in support for small businesses damaged in the riots and over $42 million toward public safety statewide.
The president's visit to Kenosha is yet another powerful reminder that the Democratic Party's recent rhetoric on law and order is fundamentally detached from reality. Despite the fact that the Left has consistently backed the "Black Lives Matter" movement—the same Marxist movement that routinely calls for defunding the police—the Democrats now insist that President Trump is the source of violence in America. That is utterly ludicrous.
Even Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, who initially refused to visit Kenosha, is desperately trying to rebrand himself as a law and order candidate after failing for months to condemn mass violence and riots in some of America's biggest cities. Biden's belated visit to Kenosha was largely overshadowed by one of the gaffes for which the former vice president is infamous, when Biden strangely joked that they would "shoot" him if he went over his allotted time in order to talk about his policy agenda in detail.
Despite paying lip service to the notion that rioting and looting are unacceptable during his speech, Biden mainly focused on blaming "institutional racism" for making people "angry," implying that violence and destruction are understandable responses.
The president has taken a very different approach—one rooted in the notion that lawlessness must never be tolerated. In June, he warned that the federal government would act quickly to quell unrest if local authorities fail to protect their own communities.
Unlike the Democrats, who are growing increasingly frightened about losing yet another presidential election to an opponent who actually puts the interests of Americans first, the people of Kenosha, Wisconsin—and Americans across the country—are certainly thankful that their president continues to do all he can to keep us safe and secure.
Boris Epshteyn is the strategic advisor for coalitions on the Trump 2020 campaign and served in the White House as special assistant to the president and assistant communications director for surrogate operations.
The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.
