One by one, blue cities and states across the country are learning the hard way that elections have consequences. Rampant violent crime in Chicago or Washington, D.C.; unaffordable cost of living in New York, New Jersey, and California; public health crises due to homelessness and public drug use in Los Angeles and San Francisco...the evidence is everywhere of once-great cities and states now suffering after years of left-wing leadership. The latest example is Seattle, just months removed from replacing their liberal Democrat mayor with avowed "Democratic Socialist" Katie Wilson. Now, some Seattle residents are resorting to putting up barricades in their own neighborhoods to protect against a violent crime wave sweeping parts of the city.
Fox News recently spoke with some of these residents. "We're just afraid that a neighbor will have to die before the city will do something," said one woman. "It's terrifying to live here," said another man. "And it's even more terrifying that the city is doing absolutely nothing to protect the citizens in this neighborhood."
The city is promising to remove the barriers and increase patrols in those areas, but Seattle radio host Jason Rantz says that won't work either, due to the undermanned police force. "We have just under 900 officers for the entire city of Seattle, in a city that needs about 1,600," Rantz tells Fox News. "So they can do enforcement for a day or two, but you're just leaving another neighborhood vulnerable."
It's not like Seattle voters couldn't see this coming. Back in 2020, Wilson wrote an op-ed calling for defunding Seattle Police to the tune of cutting their budget in half. Still voters, many seduced by the promises of socialism, decided to elect Wilson last fall.
Now they are stuck with her, and forced to engage in Trumpian behavior---building walls. Still, Rantz cautions that this is only a small subset of Seattle residents in one neighborhood, so don't expect the city to go MAGA anytime soon. "I don't see any big change happening amongst the voters," he tells Fox. "It is slow...but it is happening that some people are changing their minds and realizing how bad things are."
"The problem is, you have to personally experience how bad things are in Seattle before anyone seems to be able to change their mind."