Pelosi played a key role in passing the American Rescue Plan. This plan allocated money for pandemic relief and increased the child tax credit. President Joe Biden signed it into law in March. The bill was defeated by every Republican member of Congress, giving Democrats new ammunition.Establishment Democrats have been under attack for months by both Republicans who claim that Democrats want to weaken law enforcement and members of their own progressive wing who are critical of how the party bent to certain attacks. These moderate Democrats are now fighting back, namely by highlighting Republicans vote for the American Rescue Plan (Congresss coronavirus assistance package) and Democrats only major legislative achievement.Democrats in Congress are launching a new strategy to blame Republicans for defunding the police as the 2022 midterm elections near. According to Democratic aides the messaging change is coming from Nancy Pelosi, House Speaker.According to the aide, at least 12 Republican districts have hired or retained officers using funds from the American Rescue Plan. This includes the districts of Reps. Dan Crenshaw in Texas and Elise Stefanik in New York. Both of these representatives have claimed repeatedly that Democrats want the police to be defunded. The aide stated that these are the places where Democrats will hold them accountable and discuss the fact they voted against funding their local police departments.The Democrats will continue to promote the message that they are the party for economic recovery ahead of the 2022 midterms. However, the Democrats' attack on law enforcement funding will be a new part their offensive strategy. According to the aide, members are eager to respond. Republicans spent an entire year lying about the Democratic support and votes. Democrats are excited by the fact that Democrats have settled on a line to fight back and to take offense.One senior Democratic aide spoke under anonymity to say that localities have begun to use the funds from the package to hire additional officers, retain current officers and prevent other first responders being laid off. This means that Democrats can now talk about specific areas where police officers are being retained. They were able talk about it more concretely than they could theoretically. It was much easier to expose hypocrisy in policing after Americans saw Republicans disrespect officers who protected them on January 6.Many members have begun to implement the strategy. Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) tweeted Thursday that the Radical Republican and former President are disrespecting police officers. My colleagues from the opposite side of the aisle in @HouseJudiciary were again discussing supporting the police and funding the police. However, they voted against the American Rescue Plan's opportunity to fund the police. Rep. Val Demings (D-Fla.), Orlando's former chief police officer, tweeted the previous morning: "Watch what they do, and not what they say." Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.) tweeted the same slogan earlier this month: 4 Months ago: All Republicans voted against #AmericanRescuePlan, including funding for Police. 1 Month Ago: 21 Republicans voted to deny Police recognition for their efforts during the Capitol riot. Now: Capitol Police could run out of money. Pay attention to what they do and not what they say.The Democratic National Committee has also adopted this new attack strategy. The DNC released a press release on Tuesday describing Capitol Police officers as those who testified before Congress during the first hearing of its select committee investigating the January 6th riot. It also criticised Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) for "counterprogramming" police officers.According to another Democratic aide the strategy was not intended to be successful with Republican voters. It is meant to provide cover for moderate members who complain that calls to defund police would hurt their margins in 2020. The majority of the population lives in the suburbs. The suburbs provide cover and they can return to their districts with a message. They have something to fire back with. One of the reasons for criticism from Beltway strategists, moderates, and others last cycle was that Republicans accused Democrats of wanting defund law enforcement. We didn't have anything to respond to them. They added that now you have something to respond to. Democrats would be foolish to not carry this strategy into the midterms. You will be running on the American Rescue Plan and child tax credit in the midterm. Part of that strategy is to hit Republicans for their votes.At least on Twitter, the GOP has already responded to the new messaging. Don Lemon, a CNN anchor, asked Biden about his response to the criticisms of Republicans regarding the party's desire to defund police. Biden stated that he did not support the idea and that he doesn't know of any communities that don't want police. A clip from Biden's answer was tweeted by the House GOP Twitter account, which wrote: So why do Democrats support defunding police?Robyn Patterson (Pelosis deputy communications director) replied to the House GOP tweet by saying that Republicans couldn't name a single Democrat in Congress who voted for defunding the police. Fox News can however name 50 Senate Republicans and 210 House Republicans who voted for it.Patterson stated in a follow-up statement that Patterson made to The Intercept: Our top message will always remain the economy and the money we are putting into the pockets and pockets of working and middle-class families. We will force Republicans to admit their hypocrisy, explain why they voted to defund their police departments, disrespect officers who protected Capitol from violent Insurrectionists, as well as to support common-sense legislation to keep guns out the hands of those who shouldn't have them, as long as they lie about crime.It is not clear that all members of the caucus are on board. Many progressive members advocated for reallocating funds away from law enforcement agencies to community services. This includes Reps. Alexandria OcasioCortez (D-N.Y.); Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.); and Cori Bush (D-Mo. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass. The American Recovery Plan was not the first time Republicans have voted to do this. The House approved by voice vote in 2019 an Ocasio Cortez amendment to shift millions of dollars from Drug Enforcement Agency to opioid recovery and treatment programs.Ocasio Cortez stated that there is a lot of resistance, especially from Republicans, to the idea of reallocating and defunding certain resources during a virtual townhall in June with Bowman, in response to a question from the audience about how each member would transfer funds away from New York Police Department. Ocasio Cortez stated that, prior to last year's protests in 2019, almost all members of the Republican party voted for a defunding amendment to our appropriations. Because addiction is a problem that affects their lives, it's easy for them see the importance of not treating it as a crime. It should be treated as a public health problem.
