During a speech at a predominantly African American church in South Los Angeles on Thursday, Mayor Eric Garcetti talked about the attention he claims to have received from other mayors across the country after he proposed slashing the police department’s budget by as much as $150 million.
“I got calls from mayors around the country, some of them saying ‘I’m so excited,’ and other ones saying ‘What the hell did you do, now I’ve gotta shift money,'” said the mayor. “That’s exactly the point. It starts someplace, and we say we are going to be who we want to be, or we’re going to continue being the killers that we are.”
CBS Los Angeles reports that the mayor’s budget cut will be used to partially fund a $250 million increase to address “health and education issues” affecting black communities, although the exact programs the money will go to remains unclear.
After Garcetti made his remarks, Jamie McBride, an official with the Los Angeles Police Protective League, issued a harsh rebuke of the mayor.
“He smeared every single police officer in Los Angeles and across the nation by calling us killers,” said McBride, reports the Los Angeles Times.
“Eric, do you really believe that Los Angeles police officers are killers?” asked McBride, reports Patch. “The same officers that provide you 24-hour security extra measures at your residence 365 days a year?”
The LA Times previously reported that Garcetti’s out-of-state travels between 2015 and 2018 cost taxpayers nearly $450,000 of security from the Los Angeles Police Department. This figure does not include salaries or overtime pay for officers, or reflect any costs not related to travel.
The mayor said during a press conference on Friday that his “killers” comment was taken out of context, and that his message was that we “collectively have a choice of whether we’ll be those who heal or whether we’ll continue being the killers,” according to the Associated Press. Garcetti also told Chuck Todd on MSNBC on Friday afternoon that he didn’t regret using the word.
“I’ll push back against anybody. I said ‘all of us,’ meaning 100% of us as Americans,” said Garcetti. “If we make a choice to allow death to happen in this country, to allow, if you grew up in Watts, to have 12 years less of life than if you grew up in Bel-Air.”
As reported by LAist, McBride also suggested Garcetti may no longer be suited to serve as mayor: “We are honestly concerned about his mental health, and I think that he should seek some help, and maybe have someone to talk to, a counselor or something, and reflect on some of his decisions, reflect on his ability to lead the city and keep the citizens safe.”
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