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Barr Warns About ‘Blood and Mayhem’ If Police Budgets Get Cut

Barr Takes Trump Law-and-Order Message on the Road After Covid Isolation

Attorney General William Barr warned against efforts to cut local police budgets, saying “blood and mayhem” will continue unless voters start “paying attention” to who they elect for public office.

Barr took President Donald Trump’s law-and-order agenda on the road Wednesday, meeting with officials in Albuquerque, New Mexico, to discuss Operation Legend, a targeted joint effort of federal, state and local law enforcement officials to combat violent crime in select cities. But he made clear that politics was also on his agenda.

Barr Warns About ‘Blood and Mayhem’ If Police Budgets Get Cut

“If you want to be safe, if you are tired of the blood and mayhem on the streets, then you have to start paying attention to who you vote for,” Barr said.

Wading into the controversy over cutting police budgets, he added, “people will get what they pay for in law enforcement.”

Barr has joined Trump in promoting a strong law enforcement message as the Nov. 3 election approaches, including criticizing left-wing protesters while being less vocal about right-wing actions, such as a plot that law enforcement foiled last week to kidnap Michigan’s Democratic governor.

Barr didn’t publicly address the plot against Governor Gretchen Whitmer in brief public remarks on Wednesday during which he didn’t take questions from reporters. But the nation’s top law enforcement officer considers the failed plan “abhorrent” and he “fully supports the FBI investigation and the work of the U.S. Attorney’s office,” according to his spokeswoman, Kerri Kupec.

It was Barr’s first public appearance since he went into self-isolation after attending a Sept. 26 White House event that is believed to have been a major spreader of Covid-19. Barr repeatedly tested negative for the coronavirus after the event and returned to work at the Justice Department last week.

Although Trump portrays himself as the “law and order” candidate, he’s called on Barr to prosecute his political enemies, including his rival in the election, former Vice President Joe Biden. Trump has repeatedly refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power should he lose the election, saying he thinks the vote will be “rigged” against him.

Trump also has called for federal law enforcement officers to be stationed at voting locations and for his supporters to stand watch at polling places, stoking tensions over the risk for violence on Election Day.

The Justice Department hasn’t announced its plan for the election, including how many officials may be sent to polling places. But Barr has backed Trump’s criticism of the potential for fraud due to the widespread use of mail-in ballots, something voting experts see as unlikely.

In a departure from past practice, Barr’s department has decided to allow prosecutors to make public announcements and take overt investigative steps when it comes to election fraud cases in the days leading up to the presidential vote. That breaks with a longstanding tradition of not taking public actions that could be seen as affecting the outcome.

Department spokesman Matt Lloyd said the move was “simply part of that ongoing process of providing routine guidance regarding election-related matters.”

Later this week, Barr plans to travel to St. Louis, Missouri, to talk about Operation Legend and to speak at a law enforcement conference in New Orleans.

©2020 Bloomberg L.P.