Years ago the public had great faith and trust in the police. These days that’s no longer the case. Let’s try to see why.

Today a relatively high percentage of police officers support Donald Trump for president. Many of the officers must believe that Trump was not responsible for the Jan. 6 “protest”. Note the word protest as opposed to “insurrection.” The police are supposed to be near expert in handling investigations and uncovering the real facts…the truth.

Jan. 6! Was it a protest or an insurrection? Those of us who watched it on television have no doubts. It was an insurrection. When members of Congress feared for their lives, hunted down by members of the mob, they knew it was an insurrection. Republicans like Mitch McConnell called it “a dark day for Congress and our country” when “criminals brutalized police officers and used force to try to stop Congress from doing its job.” He went on to say, “There’s no question – none – that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day. No question about it,” calling it “a disgraceful, disgraceful dereliction of duty.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham response was shorter: “All I can say is count me out. Enough is enough.”

Congressman Kevin McCarthy said Trump’s conduct on Jan. 6 had been “atrocious and totally wrong.” He faulted the president for ‘inciting people” to attack the Capitol, saying that Trump’s remarks at a rally on the National Mall that day were “not right by any shape or any form.”

I challenge every member of the police force to check out the statements that came out of the mouths of these Republican members of Congress to prove that it is not the truth. I seriously doubt  that they can.

Want more evidence? Approximately 140 police officers were assaulted Jan. 6 at the Capitol, including 80 from the U.S. Capitol Police and about 60 from the Metropolitan Police Department. Shouldn’t those who assaulted them be punished?

I guess having 140 police officers being assaulted means nothing to the police officers who are supporting Trump. If they can’t support 140 of their own, how can we, the public, expect them to support and protect us? How can we trust them? They know all about investigations and interrogation techniques. They should know the difference between truth and lies. Before Trump got into politics, they knew he was slime and that he didn’t care about them at all.  As a matter of fact, Trump personally sought to decapitate state and local police funding every year that he was in office. You don’t have to be a detective to check out that fact.

My question is: Why do they support Trump? My guess is that they either don’t understand the law and what their job is about or they were not trained properly to distinguish fact from fiction. I find it amazing how they believed the lies that came out of Trump’s mouth. As police, they should all be able to recognize the danger he poses to our country.

Must we the people repeat the truths over and over again to bring sanity back to the American way of life. Perhaps the police should take to heart the new motto of America’s greatest crime fighter who believes in “Truth, Justice and a Better Tomorrow.” Fact or Fiction? That’s what the real police must stand for.

Alvin Goldberg

Great Neck