AOC Attempts to Provide Context for Calls to ‘Defund the Police’ After Barack Obama’s Criticism

It was reported that in an interview yesterday, Barack Obama issued criticism of the “defund the police” movement and called it a “snappy” catchphrase that’s more interested in making people “feel good” than creating change.

“I guess you can use a snappy slogan, like defund the police, but, you know, you lost a big audience the minute you say it, which makes it a lot less likely that you’re actually going to get the changes you want done,” Obama said while suggesting activists take a different messaging approach.

Obama asked, “The key is deciding, do you want to actually get something done, or do you want to feel good among the people you already agree with?”

“If you want to get something done in a democracy, in a country as big and diverse as ours, then you’ve got to be able to meet people where they are. And play a game of addition and not subtraction,” Obama insisted.

New York Dem. House Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez indirectly responded to the news today by attempting to provide context to the calls to “defund the police.”

“What if activists aren’t PR firms for politicians & their demands are bc police budgets are exploding, community resources are shrinking to bankroll it, & ppl brought this up for ages but it wasn’t until they said ‘defund’ that comfortable people started paying attn to brutality,” AOC stated in a tweet.

What if activists aren’t PR firms for politicians & their demands are bc police budgets are exploding, community resources are shrinking to bankroll it, & ppl brought this up for ages but it wasn’t until they said “defund” that comfortable people started paying attn to brutality

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) December 2, 2020

Calls to “defund the police” remain popular, with far-left activists including the phrase in their Twitter names, along with other slogans like Black Lives Matter or showing that they support the Democratic Socialists by including a red rose.