On Wednesday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Ingraham Angle,” Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) reacted to the recent crimes in Memphis by stating that we’ve reached this point partially due to “failures of the left across America to treat criminals as the criminals they are.” And said that most people in Memphis wished that these criminals had spent more time in jail.
Cotton said, “The people of Memphis deserve much better than what they’ve gotten from their city government. In just the last few days, you’ve seen these crimes. That is reflective of crime going back in Memphis for a long time. It’s reflective of crime in big cities across America. … [W]e got to this point, in part, because of failures of the left across America to treat criminals as the criminals they are. We do not have an over-incarceration problem in this country, as the left says, even as some Republicans say.”
Cotton further stated, Democrats across the country have eliminated the bail system. They’ve shortened prison sentences. They’ve eliminated the death penalty. They sympathize with criminals more than their victims. And then, when you see crime rampages like we’ve seen in Memphis in the last few days, like cities — as you’ve seen in Philadelphia, what’s the Democrats’ solution? It’s to take away your right as a law-abiding citizen to defend yourself and your family.”
Cotton added, “And in fact, the people who are most harmed by this crime wave are likely to be minorities. Memphis is a majority African American city. Look at what they’ve had to deal with, not just in the last few days, but in months and years of rising crime. The same is the case in so many cities across America. The Democratic left has failed African Americans where crime is rising in their neighborhoods.”
He concluded, “I think most citizens in Memphis wish that this killer had spent more than just a few years in jail for his crimes or Eliza Fletcher and her family wish that her killer had spent more time in jail than what he did for his heinous crimes. Prison is there, not only to punish and to deter, but also to incapacitate.”
According to The Memphis Commerical Appeal, the suspect in the shooting spree on Wednesday has prior arrests for attempted first-degree murder and reckless endangerment in 2020 and was sentenced to three years, but released in March of this year. The Daily Beast reports that the suspect was indicted in 2020 for attempted murder, weapons possession, and reckless endangerment with a deadly weapon and received a three-year sentence.
The suspected killer of Eliza Fletcher received a 24-year sentence for kidnapping, of which he served 20 years.
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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