(RepublicanNews.org) – As violent crime sweeps cities across the country, Republican governors are pushing back against the lax attitude to crime that has characterized the Democrat-Progressive approach in recent years.
Nevada’s Governor Joe Lombardo is backing SB 412, the Crime Reduction Act, which would give police more power to deal with crime. All 17 county sheriffs in Nevada back the measure.
SB 412 would lower the threshold for bringing felony charges on retail theft and drug possession, in hopes that stronger consequences will deter more crimes. Across the country, once-open shelves in stores and pharmacies are behind locked glass cases or bars. The open shoplifting and looting that has become common, especially in Democrat-led cities, is behind conservative efforts to get back to being tough on crime.
A group of Nevada sheriffs sent Lombardo a letter backing his efforts. It said that public safety “starts by undoing many of the failed policies that have been enacted.”
One of those failed policies, in their view, is the 2019 law that lowered penalties for many crimes, including possession of fentanyl. The drug is a synthetic analog of morphine, but it is 100 times more potent by weight than morphine, making fatal overdoses tragically common.
The sheriffs point out that the 2019 law made fentanyl possession a mere misdemeanor, even if the amount a suspect had in his possession was enough to kill hundreds or thousands of people.
The same law raised the threshold for pursuing shoplifters to a value of $1,200, even higher than California’s $950 limit. Critics have said such laws are merely legalizing robbery by telling criminals they can walk into stores and simply walk out with whatever they like, so long as the amount is less than the legal limit.
Store surveillance video from cities around the U.S. seems to bear this out. Criminals can be seen stuffing bags with merchandise with no apparent fear of being stopped or identified.
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