Speaker 1: Crime is a growing issue in America political issue. More
Speaker 1: and more people catching on with the fact that crime
Speaker 1: is up, all different kinds of categories of crime. And
Speaker 1: you know what you need to bring down crime, you
Speaker 1: need cops. Well, that's a problem lots of different places,
Speaker 1: including in Seattle. Right now, we're gonna talk to Mike Solan,
Speaker 1: who's the president of the Seattle Police Officers Guild. Mike,
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Armstrong and Getty Show. Hey, happy to
Speaker 1: be here. Appreciate you having me yet, Yeah, I want
Speaker 1: to talk about this and you know we're talking specifically
Speaker 1: about Seattle, but similar problems all across America. I'm reading
Speaker 1: right here. Over the last year and a half, the
Speaker 1: Seattle Police Department has lost two hundred and fifty police officers,
Speaker 1: which is the equivalent of over three hundred thousand service
Speaker 1: officers on path to losing three hundred police officers. That's
Speaker 1: a lot of calls that are gonna go unheeded. That's
Speaker 1: a lot of criminals that aren't gonna get arrested. That's
Speaker 1: a lot of deterrence that's not gonna happen. Um, So
Speaker 1: tell me what's going on. Well, your statistics are spot
Speaker 1: on and as you and I both know, statistics and
Speaker 1: data do not lie. But the activist Twitter mob that
Speaker 1: is in control of Seattle's public safety political discourse dictates
Speaker 1: how things are done in Seattle, and our politicians acquiesced
Speaker 1: to the mob. And the problem is is we're now
Speaker 1: left with the reasonable citizens in the city who still
Speaker 1: support public safety and the cops. Um, they're the ones
Speaker 1: left hold in the bag. And here we are, we've
Speaker 1: lost a third of the officers and they continue to
Speaker 1: leave because a year ago when the mayor and a
Speaker 1: current mayoral candidate who's the current president of the city
Speaker 1: Council publicly applauded this agency is the modeled, reformed agency
Speaker 1: and just that happened days before George Floyd. And obviously
Speaker 1: when George Floyd happened, they completely pivoted their political talking
Speaker 1: points and the political betrayal from that experience as what's
Speaker 1: left to this vacuum and as public safety crisis that
Speaker 1: we are experiencing in Seattle. Um. But to your point,
Speaker 1: anybody that supported the defund nonsense, This type of crime
Speaker 1: and low staffing numbers is now a rampant throughout major
Speaker 1: urban cities. Yeah, all across America and I've got a
Speaker 1: friend who was a police officer, and I won't mention where,
Speaker 1: but in a big city. And um, and he actually
Speaker 1: retired a little earlier than he was planning. And when
Speaker 1: he retired, he said he didn't realize how much pressure
Speaker 1: he was feeling until he retired, just that every time
Speaker 1: he was on a call, he was worried. You know, here,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna end up being a viral video. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: end up a household name for just doing my job.
Speaker 1: And maybe I make a mistake, maybe I don't, doesn't
Speaker 1: make any difference. And uh and and just the pressure
Speaker 1: of that is that, what's is that what's causing cops
Speaker 1: to quit? And the other question I want to answer
Speaker 1: to both of these is that why cops are quitting?
Speaker 1: And are you having trouble getting people to apply? You know, well,
Speaker 1: to your last point, it's very difficult now to get
Speaker 1: people to apply to be a police officer, not just
Speaker 1: in Seattle, but I believe nationwide. Uh. As you know,
Speaker 1: the riots post George Floyd, the activists, the antiphon mob,
Speaker 1: the Twitter mobs are referred to them as they specifically
Speaker 1: targeted officers. They've docked them, they've harassed them, they've marched
Speaker 1: on private homes, they've done they've done everything they can
Speaker 1: to try to break the system and break the spirit
Speaker 1: of police officers. And I believe it's that people that
Speaker 1: are culpable are obviously are effectless politicians that don't have
Speaker 1: the courage or the backbone to stand up to the
Speaker 1: Twitter mob. But there's a continued political narrative to target
Speaker 1: specific parts of the criminal justice system, meaning the police
Speaker 1: officers for just being there to do the job. And
Speaker 1: there is this fear that if you make one mistake
Speaker 1: as a human during the doing the job of a
Speaker 1: police officer, that that mistake will be amplified by the
Speaker 1: activist mob, then obviously amplified even more with the media,
Speaker 1: particular people that don't really want to put the real
Speaker 1: message out to the American citizens. And then it's literally
Speaker 1: that police officer, that individual police officer that has left
Speaker 1: holding the bag, and they're the ones whose career and
Speaker 1: more often than not, their livelihood, their personal lives are
Speaker 1: ruined because of just the job they chose to do
Speaker 1: to serve our communities. So these are just kind of
Speaker 1: general themes we're talking about, and it's all true and
Speaker 1: it's all a problem. But let's just talk about like
Speaker 1: the reality nuts and bolts. If you're down officers in
Speaker 1: a city like Seattle, what what actually happens? Do you
Speaker 1: just are there? Are the police just spread further apart?
Speaker 1: Are there just less people on shift at any given time?
Speaker 1: So the so if you have dialline one one, that
Speaker 1: takes that much longer to get somebody. I mean, what
Speaker 1: what happens in reality? Yeah? The reality is is that
Speaker 1: crimes don't go excuse me, crimes do not get investigated
Speaker 1: to the degree that they used to be investigated. You're
Speaker 1: going to have longer wait times to get a police
Speaker 1: officer to you. And currently right now we're experiencing a
Speaker 1: spike and obviously the overtime because they have to spend
Speaker 1: money for officers just to fill the uniform to meet
Speaker 1: that patrol staffing level, which would be somewhat of a
Speaker 1: reasonable approach or response time to meet somebody's priority one
Speaker 1: need and the priority one call us basically a straight
Speaker 1: up the emergency. And right now we're feeling the effects
Speaker 1: of our people are are burnt out. The people that
Speaker 1: are still left, they're doing double shifts. The money allotted
Speaker 1: for overtime is through the roof, and this is a
Speaker 1: staffing crisis that will take decades to recover, all because
Speaker 1: of the political betrayal by our elected officials in the
Speaker 1: City of Seattle. When I mentioned a year ago, they
Speaker 1: were applauding us as being a modeled, reformed agency who
Speaker 1: were at hearing to the Department of Justice reform guidelines.
Speaker 1: And obviously days later when Floyd unfortunately happened in Minneapolis,
Speaker 1: these politicians couldn't walk away from as fast enough and
Speaker 1: that's what's led to this what I call an erosion
Speaker 1: in public safety in the city of Seattle. Mike Soullan,
Speaker 1: President Seattle Police Officers Guild, where we appreciate you coming
Speaker 1: on today and we'll check back in with you um
Speaker 1: over the coming months to see you know, I feel
Speaker 1: like the pendulum is going to swing back the other
Speaker 1: direction because to fund the police is one of the
Speaker 1: stupidest political um phrases and and things to run on
Speaker 1: in the history of politics, and it's not popular at all,
Speaker 1: even for Democrats. But thanks for coming on today, appreciate it,
Speaker 1: are you bet? And the just recall to action for people,
Speaker 1: do you gotta get involved and start getting involved in
Speaker 1: elections at your local school boards. And if you want
Speaker 1: further follow up, please visit my podcast Hold the Line
Speaker 1: with Mike Soland, available on all podcasts and Seattle Police
Speaker 1: Officers dot Com really appreciate you having me on you
Speaker 1: bet you, thank you. And Joe's coming up in a
Speaker 1: little bit Joe Getty and um, you know it's something
Speaker 1: Joe always says? Is that? Uh? Um, what does Joey say?
Speaker 1: It popped out of my head. What does Jolie say? Hey, Joe,
Speaker 1: what do you always say? I'll ask him when he
Speaker 1: comes on. Um, the it's amazing. How oh about the
Speaker 1: idea of these things catching on the and and people
Speaker 1: get like a fever for these weird ideas, um like
Speaker 1: the defund the police, and a bunch of politicians say, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm for defunding the police. It sounds like a good idea,
Speaker 1: and a tiny percentage of people got all worked all
Speaker 1: whipped up about this stupid, stupid idea. When the majority
Speaker 1: of Americans, including Democrats and particularly people who live in
Speaker 1: crime written neighborhoods, they want more. It's not fewer in
Speaker 1: it it, but but it caught on. Corporate media latched
Speaker 1: onto it and it became a thing, and here we are.
Speaker 1: You got towns like Seattle where they're down three hundred
Speaker 1: cops soon and you just can't function as a city.
Speaker 1: It's really weird, strong,