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Minneapolis Police Chief Rips City’s ‘Bizarre’ Liberalism In Wake of George Floyd Death

Charlie Kirk Staff

05/20/2025

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Minneapolis Police Chief Rips City’s ‘Bizarre’ Liberalism In Wake of George Floyd Death

Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara criticized the “bizarre” progressive ideology that swept through the city following the death of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, in an interview with the New York Post on Friday.

The Post spoke with Minneapolis law enforcement officials and business owners ahead of the upcoming five-year anniversary of Floyd’s death, which ignited worldwide protests and riots led by the Black Lives Matter movement.

O’Hara, who previously served in the Newark, New Jersey Police Department, became chief of the Minneapolis Police Department in November 2022.

Although he came from a left-wing Democrat-run city, O’Hara said he was unprepared for the level of politicization surrounding law enforcement in Minneapolis. He described a prevailing “bourgeois liberal mentality” that, in his view, has made it difficult for “reality and facts” to gain traction.

“Here it’s very, very ideological and a lot of times it’s like reality and facts can’t get through the filter. It’s a very detached, bourgeois liberal mentality… It’s bizarre,” he told The Post.

“There has been an unbelievable amount of trauma here from the destruction of the city that immediately followed (Floyd’s death) and the explosion of violence that came,” O’Hara added.

Following Floyd’s death, the Minneapolis Police Department experienced a mass exodus of officers, hitting its lowest staffing levels in 40 years, according to a September 2023 analysis by the Minneapolis Star Tribune. The decline came amid a nationwide wave of anti-police sentiment and widespread calls to defund law enforcement.

Members of the progressive-leaning Minneapolis City Council criticized the police chief’s comments in response to the Star Tribune report.

Council Member Jason Chavez, who claimed he was inspired to run for office after Floyd’s death, called the police chief’s words “not only disrespectful” but “counterproductive and condescending.”

He went on to put blame on the Trump administration, for some reason.

“These comments directed at our residents fail to meet the moment we are in when people’s rights are under attack from the federal government and our communities are rightfully pushing back,” he said.

Council President Elliott Payne also took issue with O’Hara’s remarks, telling the outlet, “Some people come into their politics through a more academic process, others through solidarity, others through lived experience,” Payne said. “No matter how people develop their core values, one should have a deeper understanding of the diverse perspectives of our community before engaging in conversations with New York tabloids.”

The Post is the oldest newspaper in the country.

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Charlie Kirk is the Founder and President of Turning Point USA, a national student movement dedicated to empowering young people to promote the principles of free markets and limited government.

Charlie is also the host of “The Charlie Kirk Show” podcast, which regularly ranks among the top-10 news shows on Apple podcast news charts, and is the host of the nationally syndicated daily radio show on the Salem Radio Network live from 12 - 3 PM ET.
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