The sanctuary city’s effort to declare war on the federal government is putting its citizens in danger.
The latest move in defiance by San Francisco is dropping out of the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF,) an anti-terror initiative that began following the 9/11 attack.
This task force has halted 93 Islamist terrorist attacks and plots in the U.S. since 2001– 11 of which were from this year.
Nonetheless, the San Francisco police department still made the decision to halt the city’s partnership with the JTTF.
This has been in response to the many local activist groups that have claimed that the task force wrongly targets Arabs and Muslims.
“In my opinion, the decision by the mayor and the police chief to withdraw the San Francisco Police Department from the JTTF is really narrow-minded,” said Mark Rossini, a retired FBI special agent to Fox News. “Politics aside, and the mayor and leaders of San Francisco have their right to their opinion, political opinion and beliefs. But when you’re working in law enforcement, law enforcement should know no politics.”
As the tensions continue to build with the terrorist group ISIS, there needs to be a strong connection between the federal government and local ones.
“After 9/11, Congress required U.S. law enforcement to increase the flow of intel between federal agencies and local police,” said Shannon Bream of Fox News. “But in the wake of President Trump’s election, the San Francisco police department says it’s pulling out of the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, and it’s cutting ties.”
It looks like the city believes that it’s more important to protect a small segment of its population.
“San Francisco says it doesn’t want it’s police gathering intelligence or surveilling Muslims or anyone else involved with political protests,” said Will La Jeunesse of Fox News. “or to keep records, and they fear that will happen illegally under President Trump. The critics say pulling out of the JTTF is short-sighted, and dangerous.”
While, CAIR, the Muslim advocacy group and other groups applauded the San Fran police department decision to pull out of the task force.
“After seven years of advocacy we welcome the suspension of SFPD participation in the JTTF,” said Brittney Rezaei, CAIR-SFBA Civil Rights Attorney. “As our concerns with the conduct of the federal government increase, we are happy to see our police department take this important step to ensure its commitment to protecting our community.”
Allegedly these groups claim that the JTTF has specifically targeted Muslim activists.
“The Task Forces have led raids of activists’ homes and offices for merely engaging in the right to dissent. In the face of ever-increasing repression by the federal government, we applaud local agencies’ decision to suspend participation in the JTTF,” said Nina Farnia, President of the San Francisco chapter of the National Lawyers Guild.
San Francisco is the only city to leave the JTTF, but this could only be temporary. The JTTF agreement has expired and is still under review.
But the city has made it clear that civil rights issues outweigh the fight against terrorism.
“Last time I checked, we’re all part of the 50 states….So let us continue to work together when it comes to the law, when it comes to law enforcement,” said Rossini. “You want to do politics another day.”