Dana Milbank, Washington Post: “Republican leaders have developed a new strategy for ousting Democrats from their majority in Congress: Blue Lies Matter. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.) falsely tweeted Friday: ‘The ‘Defund the Police’ campaign – endorsed by Democrats – has decimated our law enforcement… When Republicans are in the majority, we will FUND the police.’ Rep. Elise Stefanik (N.Y.), falsely tweeted Monday: ‘Dems’ manta [sic] ‘Defund the Police’ was one of their top policy messaging points in 2020… GOP has always supported increasing funding for police!’ The rank and file have followed them down Mendacity Lane. Rep. Jim Banks (Ind.) said on ‘Fox News Sunday’ that ‘Joe Biden is being held hostage in the White House by the Squad and the radicals in the Democrat [sic] Party who control their party, who have spent the last year stigmatizing one of the most honorable professions in America, in our law enforcement.'”

“By midday Tuesday, a dozen House Republicans had tweeted messages about Democrats defunding the police. How, then, to explain the latest ‘legislative scorecard’ from the National Association of Police Officers, a group claiming to represent a quarter-million officers who endorsed President Donald Trump’s reelection? McCarthy, Stefanik and Banks all scored 57 percent, and some of the back-benchers piling on Tuesday – Reps. Ken Buck (Colo.), Jody Hice (Ga.), Mo Brooks (Ala.) – scored a paltry 43 percent on NAPO’s pro-police scorecard. And the Squad? Democratic Reps. Ilhan Omar (Minn.), Rashida Tlaib (Mich.) and Ayanna Pressley (Mass.) all scored 86 percent. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) scored 71 percent. Where it really counts, all four members of the Squad are more pro-police than their Republican critics. The reason is simple. Democrats, at least at the federal level, have been the ones funding the police. The 2019-2021 scorecard is based on votes on health care, pensions, covid-19 relief, bulletproof vests, victim compensation and policing reform. There’s not yet a scorecard of votes in the new Congress, but police groups favored the American Rescue Plan covid-relief legislation, which Republicans uniformly opposed, and President Biden wants to pump $300 million more into the COPS community policing program, which Republicans have long opposed.”