By Kaitlan Collins
This Monday, the Foreign and Military Affairs Committee passed the controversial COPS Act in a 9-2 vote. The bill saw criticism coming from both Republicans and Democrats in the committee.
The “Conserve Order and Police Sanctity Act” is coauthored by Senators Mitch McConnell and Marco Rubio, with cosponsors John Cornyn and Ted Cruz.
Rubio introduced the bill to the committee on Monday and was met with a lengthy amount of questioning about the bill, specifically about the many Teslas it intends to grant to police departments across the country.
The bill would grant “1 billion dollars towards refunding Police departments across the United States.” The bill clearly outlines where all of this funding would go, and after reviewing the information, it does not seem to make much sense at all.
Police departments would get up to $200 million worth of unused equipment from the military stockpile. The bill would also allow for up to 350,000 more police officers to be hired across the U.S. $100 million would go towards replacing old vehicles, with Teslas being granted to cities that have adequate access to electric charging stations. An extra $50 million would go to major cities with high crime rates, and the list goes on.
As Senator King rightfully pointed out in the committee, the spending does not add up. King explained how even just one year of salaries for 350,000 police officers could come out to $35 billion in national spending to keep up the provision of this bill for just one year. King exasperatedly stated, “I don’t suppose that we are not paying these police officers, nor giving them training, nor giving them equipment because there’s just not the money for that many police.”
It does not seem as though McConnell or Rubio put much effort into this bill at all. If they did, they would have seen the amount of money provided for the bill is clearly lacking. This lack of effort can also be seen in their bill as a whole, seeing that it is riddled with spelling and punctuation errors.
On the first page, multiple times it states the goal of the bill is “to reinforce our nations police and properly equip them for a stronger America.” Clearly, the senators meant ‘our nation’s police’ seeing as we are only one nation. And this trend continues throughout the bill with random capitalizations and clear spelling errors. While these errors in the bill are not egregious, it begs the question: how much time did the senators truly put into writing this bill? If McConnell and Rubio aren’t even double-checking their work, how can we expect this bill to also be logically sound, especially when it’s riddled with errors already?
It almost appears as though these senators were including the most ridiculous provisions they could think of. And this was evident when even their fellow Republican colleagues began to question the funding and necessity of the bill.
Senator Scott was worried about the practicality of giving police departments Teslas, given how expensive the cars are in today’s market. Senator Scott implored “Why does it have to be a Tesla?” and later stated, “I’m all for supporting the police but I’m not a fan of excess spending.”
Senator Shelby agreed with Scott, questioning Rubio on the bill’s excessive spending. Shelby implored Rubio, “Why do you think that increasing funding and increasing luxurious amenities for police would make police even better?” Rubio was quick to deny that the Teslas would be a ‘luxurious amenity’ however, many sources have classified Tesla cars as ‘luxury cars.’ At one point Shelby even exasperatedly asked “Why don’t you just give them a Prius?”
Shelby continued his questioning of Rubio much to the surprise of everyone in the committee who was shocked Shelby was fighting against one of their own. After Rubio stated that police “need our help the most” Shelby interrupted asking, “more than homeless people?” Senator Shelby only ended his questioning after McConnell came over and whispered an unheard comment in his ear. We can infer the comment was reminding Senator Shelby of his own very conservative beliefs.
Many committee members were shocked that Shelby spoke against this bill in committee, but given the contents of this bill and the troublesome economics of it, Shelby’s and the Democrats’ reaction shouldn’t come as a surprise. If Republicans want to decrease national spending, like both Senators Paul and Romney have spoken against in the past, then they should probably be turning their criticisms to their own party as well. Senator Mitch McConnell is a top spender in both his party and in the Senate overall. Marco Rubio is also classified as a ‘very high’ spender in his party and in the Senate overall as well.
Senator Rubio is right, crime is at an all-time high in some parts of the country and this problem needs to be addressed. But Senator Padilla was right as well when he stated “many experts have suggested that the best way to stop crime is by making sure that people have access to the resources they need including food, water shelter, all those kinds of things.” Senator Padilla spoke on behalf of the concerns of many senators and the American people if this bill passes: “Why should we not be focusing on addressing the needs of our people instead of just militarizing our police?”
Though the bill has passed through committee, its extreme content and criticism from both parties make it very unlikely it will ever make it to the floor.
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