Critics and skeptics of President Trump were certainly not going to listen to him when he warned about the perilous state the city of Baltimore is in, but perhaps they'll listen to actual Baltimore police officers. On Monday, the Baltimore City Fraternal Order of Police publicized some somber statistics.
Here are a few more unfortunate numbers from New York Post opinion contributor Seth Barron.
By any measure of systemic urban collapse, Baltimore is, as Trump said, “very dangerous & filthy.” Among the largest 30 American cities, Baltimore has the highest crime rate, and is a close second to Detroit for the highest rate of violent crime. But for murders, Baltimore is second to no other city, with more than 50 homicides per 100,000 people. That puts Charm City in the ranks of Jamaica, Venezuela and El Salvador in terms of lethality.
Baltimore Police Commissioner Michael Harrison hoped to address this crisis with his recent crime plan, but Baltimore City FOP President Mike Mancuso said it will do little to help. First and foremost, they don't have the staff - they don't even have enough officers to respond to all 911 calls. That's not to mention their lack of other resources.
In Mancuso's statement you'll also get a glimpse of his feelings toward Commissioner Harrison. Mancuso says he was left "speechless" by Harrison's claim the city isn't all that bad.
"This leads us to Commissioner Harrison’s recent public assertion that Baltimore is not a dangerous place; a comment which left me speechless," Mancuso wrote. "For him to try to alleviate the public’s fear of being a victim of violent crime by stating that most suspects and victims know each other, is outright fantasy."
Trump started his feud with Baltimore officials after House Oversight Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings (D-MD) confronted border patrol agents at a recent round of hearings. The president tweeted directly at Cummings, suggesting that the congressman focus on his struggling Maryland district instead of trying to upend his administration's policies.
Rep, Elijah Cummings has been a brutal bully, shouting and screaming at the great men & women of Border Patrol about conditions at the Southern Border, when actually his Baltimore district is FAR WORSE and more dangerous. His district is considered the Worst in the USA......
The city of Baltimore, Trump added, is "a disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess."