Editorials/Opinion
Stronger Families Help Reduce Crime
I am Duke Buckner, the Republican Party’s nominee for the U.S. House of Representatives in South Carolina’s Sixth Congressional District. I want to speak about the scourge of crime in the Sixth District and our nation. It is a problem of drugs, gangs, and uncontrolled illegal immigration. It is a problem that tears families apart and destroys lives. Representative Jim Clyburn and I have vastly different approaches to this issue. I will strengthen families and reduce crime; he will reduce policing and worsen crime.
If you are over forty, you can remember walking into stores with all the products available on the shelves; not locked in cabinets to stop rampant shoplifting. You can remember when mass shootings at schools were unheard of and simply didn’t happen. And you can remember a time before drugs and gangs became common in our neighborhoods.
That world is gone. More Americans than ever view crime as a “very serious problem,” particularly in South Carolina, which, in 2020, had America’s tenth-highest crime rate! South Carolina saw more murders in 2020 than ever before in the state’s recorded history:
“Gangs, drugs and criminals’ access to guns continue to play a significant role.” [South Carolina Law Enforcement Chief Mark Keel] said…
“Yet given this surge [in crime], it is very disheartening to see so much effort and attention being directed to anti-public safety legislation that puts criminals back on the street and makes our communities less safe.”
Murders have increased 51% in the past five years, according to Keel. From 2019 to 2020, they increased 25%, from 457 to 571. Aggravated assaults increased 9% in the same year, from almost 19,500 to nearly 21,300.
Nationally, recent FBI crime statistics seemingly show a significant downward trend, but as a recent article explains, those statistics are illusory because the FBI changed its reporting system in 2021.
The Democrat party’s claim that the illegal aliens who are being invited to overrun our nation are uniquely law-abiding is false. Our state has not escaped its violent impact.
South Carolina crime statistics are more trustworthy than the FBI’s. While our state’s most recent numbers show some downturn, violent crimes are still well above the levels from five years ago. It’s also notable that drug-related crimes are the most common crimes in South Carolina, specifically in the Sixth District. Those crimes may be the most insidious.
In 2021 and now in 2024, Democrats in the U.S. Congress, with full support from Rep. Clyburn, proposed a law they claim will address America’s rising criminal wave; the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act. This law will harm law enforcement. It would federalize state and local police forces; putting important decisions under federal, not local control. It would hamper local police officer’s ability to do their jobs, especially in high-crime areas, and subject them to the paralyzing effect of potential liability even for acts in good faith. Simply put, it’s playing politics with crime and punishment for political gain.
When radicals call to “reimagine” policing, they mean they do not want to be constrained by reality, logic, common sense, or the lessons of history. Human nature is what it is; no amount of “reimagining” will ever change that. The Bible tells us, “There is nothing new under the sun.” Crime will not lessen if you reduce policing; it will increase when there are no consequences for criminal behavior. Today’s inaccurate crime reports benefit politicians while hiding a problem that primarily hurts the poorest among us.
The police should be held to account for excessive force or other unconstitutional acts. This must happen if law enforcement is to earn the trust and respect of the people they serve. For example, 2018’s First Step Act helped reform the justice system and assisted former convicts rebuild their lives. This was a major step in restoring confidence in our criminal justice system. We always need to balance mercy and rehabilitation with fairness and protection of society.
Local policing is—and always should be—under state and local control so that the people most affected have the strongest voice. The federal government is too far away and paints with too broad a brush.
Still, the federal government has a responsibility and the ability to stop criminality before it ever begins. I agree with the co-founder of the NAACP, W. E. B. DuBois, that “[t]he chief problem in any community cursed with crime is not the punishment of the criminal, but the preventing of the young from being trained to crime.”
We have known for decades that criminality directly correlates with breakdowns of the family unit. Unfortunately, there are many single-parent homes in the Sixth District, and my job as your congressman will be to help those families.
To address crime in our district, I promise to support and submit legislation that strengthens the family, reduces the costs of raising a family, gives parents a choice and say in schools, recognizes the constitutional rights of parents, and improves family stability.
At the other end of the spectrum, when the issue becomes rehabilitation, I will promote duplicating nationally and in the Sixth District programs that have been proven successful elsewhere.
Criminality threatens our neighborhoods’ stability and ruins lives. Our local police, who are directly responsible to voters in their community, should be arresting people for crimes. Meanwhile, the federal government can—and should—make a difference by promoting laws and an American culture that strengthens the family and makes crime less likely to happen. That is where I will take a stand for the Sixth District.
Duke Buckner
Duke Buckner
Candidate for U.S. Congress
SC-6th District
Mobile: (843) 217-3628
P.O. Box 47 Walterboro, SC 29488
