Over the past year I have served as director of a law enforcement-supported nonprofit and engaging with police officers working in our communities almost daily.
We know and our cops know that crime is out of control. The cause is simple: Some billionaire New York and San Francisco donors worked to elect soft-on-crime district attorneys around the state and country, including George Gascón right here in Los Angeles County.
Those same donors also spent millions funding campaigns and packing state legislatures and city councils with pro-criminal legislators who passed policies like zero bail, early release, defunding the police and punishment reductions for serious crimes.
Now businesses large and small are fleeing California and people feel unsafe.
There is a helpless feeling when there aren’t enough law enforcement personnel to respond due to funding cuts and we watch social media videos of shoppers and workers standing by while hooded looters raid these shops.
It doesn’t have to be this way.
People are beginning to wake up and take a stand against these failed policies and radical politics.
In 2024 District Attorney George Gascón is up for re-election and challengers are ramping up their campaigns with themes about justice for everyone including victims, families of victims, businesses, and everyone impacted by these crime sprees.
The people are organizing for change and to take their communities back.
We aren’t helpless against the billionaires who want to socially engineer the criminal justice system while they live behind armed gates.
We can protect ourselves by passing laws that keep violent criminals in jail, prosecute smash-and-grab mobs, and end child sex trafficking.
Yet many of our leaders still pretend that solutions don’t exist, stay wedded to failed “reforms” that don’t work, and continue to insist that punishment for serious crimes is not the answer.
Instead, they try to deflect the conversation and talk about poverty or income inequality.
The fact that a current bill in the California state Legislature that will make the sex trafficking of a teenager or child a serious crime, backed up by tough punishments, has been quietly undermined tells us all we need to know about the ongoing efforts to weaken our criminal justice system even more.
I grew up in a working-class family, surrounded by poverty, and as long as I can remember, income inequality has existed.
Those are serious issues, but they aren’t the root cause nor primary solution to fixing the crime and criminal crisis we face in California.
Our community is feeling the effects of this radical, pro-criminal agenda gripping our state.
If we don’t act now to not only problem solve but also fight back against these criminal elements, the near total collapse of San Francisco serves as a warning.
Stores like T-Mobile, Whole Foods and others have thrown up their hands and left that city.
Gov. Gavin Newsom has even had to send in the National Guard and extra units of the California Highway Patrol.
All this to say is that elections matter.
Gascón and these billionaire-funded far-left politicians have been a dramatic failure.
We have the opportunity to change this direction and build a future that prioritizes public safety, supports real justice for everyone, especially victims, funds our law enforcement agencies and personnel, and kick the corruptive billionaires out.
Suzette Martinez Valladares is Santa Clarita’s former assemblywoman, wife, girl mom, avid DIY’er and a monthly contributor to The Signal’s “Right, Here Right Now,” which appears Saturdays and rotates among local Republicans.
