Over the last few days, Missouri lawmakers have leveraged tragedy as a coordinated attack on Black leaders in St. Louis in order to bolster their resumes for future political campaigns.
It’s disgusting. It’s racist. It’s misogynistic. And it willfully ignores real, pressing issues across the state.
In case you missed it: Missouri’s Attorney General, Andrew Bailey, is specifically targeting St. Louis Circuit Attorney, Kim Gardner — but notably not the Cedar County prosecutor who refused to pursue real accountability for the years-long abuse of young boys at the Agape Boarding School.
Where is his concern for the reprehensible abuse of prosecutorial power in this case?
These aren’t the only attacks — they’re using legislation as well.
On Monday, HB 301 passed in the Missouri House. This legislation directly disenfranchises St. Louis voters by removing power from our democratically-elected prosecutor.
SB78 cuts the community out of having input and control over our own local police department, making St. Louis one of the only major cities in the entire country without authority over its own police force. This gives power to the same anti-public safety Republicans who just voted to allow children to carry AR-15s.
Jefferson City politicians who are pushing HB 301 and SB 78 want to control St. Louis so badly, yet they have issues in their own districts they should be tackling. They should be focused on these priorities instead if they really want to make a difference in our communities:
Instead of tackling real issues, people like Attorney General Bailey are fabricating problems to “solve.”
Their willful ignorance doesn’t stop there. Economically speaking, Kansas City and St. Louis bring in the majority of the revenue for the state, yet that fact gets pushed aside by state lawmakers who make it harder to do what we need to do to meet the full needs of our residents.
As Cori said, we must reject these disingenuous, misogynistic, and racist calls by the Attorney General and state officials who seek to circumvent the will of the people of St. Louis who have entrusted democratically elected local officials to oversee and implement public safety.
Together we can call out this injustice and take on whatever comes next.
Thank you,
Team Cori
