Credit: Photo via Rick Scott/YouTube

Credit: Photo via Rick Scott/YouTube

U.S. Sen. Rick Scott‘s National Republican Senatorial Committee blasted “defund the police” Democrats as “crazy and dangerous” in a new ad released Wednesday.

The 30 second spot was timed as a prebuttal to President Joe Biden‘s speech Wednesday afternoon addressing surging crime, with executive orders expected.

The spot begins with a laconic Scott narrating.

“Here’s the Democrat plan for America: Crime,” Scott said, introducing footage of mob violence in the streets videotaped last summer, as riots and protests roiled cities around the country.

The Senator contends Democrats have “embraced the idea of defunding the police, which is the dumbest idea ever,” a position familiar to those tracking Scott’s media.

“Defunding the police is already causing a surge in crime in America’s cities,” Scott warned.

“Let’s remember, Democrats have embraced, and are actively pushing, a “defund the police” agenda that makes communities across the country less safe,” the release accompanying the ad advises.

Scott has been making similar arguments since calls to reprioritize law enforcement funding mounted after the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis last year.

“The single most ridiculous and irresponsible policy idea that has been suggested in my lifetime can be summed up in three words: ‘Defund the police.’ And yet, it is actually being discussed and debated as if there are pros and cons to it by those on the left. There are no ‘pros’ to defunding the police. There are no coherent arguments for this lunacy,” Scott wrote in the Washington Examiner in June 2020.

The “defund the police” trope’s return to NRSC messaging appears to be a direct result of Biden messaging on the uptick in crime, especially in urban areas.

A “battleground states poll” commissioned by the NRSC and the Republican Governors’ Association that was touted this week did not address police funding, instead covering topics including critical race theory, the COVID-19 “lab leak” theory, and the crisis at the Mexican border.

This article first appeared at Florida Politics. 

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