“The View” co-host Meghan McCain said on Monday that when she first heard the term “defund the police,” she thought it was “the stupidest thing I ever heard.”
“Democratic strategists are very concerned about how effective the terminology ‘defund the police’ has been when it comes to voting and voting in primaries,” McCain said during “The View” on Monday after co-host Sara Haines said she felt the term was used by Republicans to campaign against Democrats.
“I think it’s important for Republicans to understand that Democrats kowtow to a Twitter audience a lot of times. They kowtow to people in the media. And it has been shown that statistically that if Twitter were a voting bloc, it would be the second most liberal voting bloc … congressional district in the United States,” McCain said.
“So the biggest gift that Republicans have ever been given is the term ‘defund the police.’ And let’s make it very clear: Republicans didn’t come up with that. I thought it was the stupidest thing I ever heard when I first heard it being used.”
The phrase “defund the police” became a popular protest slogan in the summer of 2020 as many called for police departments across the country to have funding stripped in favor of alternatives in response to the killings by police of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and a number of other Black Americans.
Its use has drawn criticism from centrist Democrats and Republicans and was notably criticized by former President Trump on the campaign trail as he touted a platform of “law and order.”
McCain went on to say that she felt such messages from progressives would help Republicans pick up seats in the House and Senate in the midterm elections.
“Facts are stubborn things. There is a huge homicide crisis in the country. And whether or not AOC [Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.)] likes it, it’s OK for people to be concerned about a homicide spike. And I think that’s going to be very effective going into the midterms,” she said.
McCain’s comment followed Ocasio-Cortez saying over the weekend that there was “hysteria” over rising homicide numbers. The lawmaker suggested that people are taking data out of context.