Washington, D.C. – Fact check! CNN acknowledges that Wisconsin’s Democrat Senate candidate and Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes has signaled support for defunding the police and abolishing ICE. Yes, despite what Barnes claims – that it’s all a lie – in his ad.
CNN states: But a CNN KFile review of Barnes’ social media activity and public comments he made in interview appearances reveal a different and more nuanced picture in which Barnes often signaled his support for such positions. In multiple posts from 2018 uncovered by CNN, Barnes liked tweets that criticized the immigration agency and called to abolish them. He told a group that supported abolishing the institution in 2019 that the “wrong ICE” was melting and attended one of their “Abolish ICE” local rallies.
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Though Barnes has never outright embraced the “defund the police” slogan, he has on numerous occasions said he supports redirecting or decreasing police funding – even before the slogan gained popularity in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd by police. In one 2020 interview reviewed by CNN, Barnes told a local Wisconsin public radio show that funding should go to social workers and a “crisis intervener or a violence interrupter,” instead of police.
Read more HERE.
It’s also telling that Barnes has ZERO active law enforcement endorsements. There are 13,400 law enforcement officers in Wisconsin. Mandela Barnes is too dangerous for Wisconsin and law enforcement officials, Wisconsin families, and the press know it.
Hear more from Senator Ron Johnson from the debate:
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