After months of often violent, destructive protests in Seattle, when the local ABC affiliate—KOMO, a Sinclair Broadcasting-owned company—posted a poll on Twitter asking what steps people would take to protect their business or neighborhood, more than half of the respondents say they would arm themselves.
As this report was published, the survey result showed 23.4 percent saying they would rely on police and 25.1 percent said they would work with their neighbors. But being armed outpaced those choices more than 2-to-1, in an ultra-liberal city at the heart of a state that votes blue.
The survey came 2 ½ months after the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms issued a statement advising city residents to buy guns, get trained and get a license to carry a loaded sidearm in public.
Back on July 16, CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb advised Seattleites, “While the city council may believe crippling its police department is a politically smart move, it’s going to directly impact public safety. Nobody should be surprised when more people buy guns and apply for carry licenses.”
What steps would you take to protect your business or neighborhood?
— KOMO News (@komonews) September 24, 2020
At the time, the council had just begun talking about slashing the Police Department’s budget. Earlier this week, the council did exactly that on a 7-2 vote, overriding Mayor Jenny Durkan’s earlier veto of the budget that contained the funding cuts.
The turmoil in Seattle is not good for the city’s tourism trade, according to a separate KOMO story.
More than 100,000 citizens living in King County—the most populous county in Washington State, which encompasses Seattle—are licensed to carry concealed handguns. There is every reason to believe that number would have climbed over the past six months, but the Seattle Police Department and King County Sheriff’s Office both suspended accepting new CPL applications in mid-March.
That’s not an option apparently allowed by state law, which mandates, “The issuing authority shall not refuse to accept completed applications for concealed pistol licenses during regular business hours.”
Interestingly, since the KOMO survey and results are posted on the station’s Twitter page, many of the reactions to this poll are attention-getters.
“The ‘defund the police’ insanity being pushed by Democrats means that we no longer have the luxury of not owning the weapons we will need to defend our homes, our families and our neighborhoods,” wrote one respondent.
“Lovely divisive poll,” wrote another KOMO viewer. “Everyone should be armed and act as their own first responder. But that doesn’t mean one can’t band together with neighbors to collectively protect assets. Relying solely on the police is fool hardy these days and be too late when (if) they finally arrive.”
A third individual simply suggested, “Shoot first, ask questions later when it comes to a business or home.”
Many others seemed horrified at the questions, while a few suggested vigilantism.
The poll had gotten more than 2,200 votes as of Friday morning, which is four times the number of people who were contacted in a recent statewide survey for KOMO that determined Democrat Gov. Jay Inslee leads Republican challenger Loren Culp by double-digits.
