SEATTLE NEWS ARCHIVES & FEATURES
Seattle Police Officers Guild president: ‘We need leadership, and we need it fast’
Aug 27, 2020, 11:51 AM
An officer watches from the King County Juvenile Detention building as protesters rally in support of defunding police on August 5, 2020 in Seattle, Washington. (Photo by David Ryder/Getty Images)
(Photo by David Ryder/Getty Images)
Earlier this week in Seattle, a crowd used a cement mixture to try to seal the door to the East Precinct with police officers inside, and then they set a fire. Thankfully, it did not engulf the building. On that same evening, two individuals threw Molotov cocktails at the Seattle Police Officers Guild (SPOG) building in SoDo, Mike Solan, president of SPOG, told KIRO Radio’s Dori Monson Show.
“It’s quite clear that there are people that are hunting cops to kill them, and this is very concerning,” Solan said. “I’m demanding that our elected officials publicly decry these acts, demand that this violence stops, because I believe, if they come out forceful, they could have an impact to stop this nonsense.”
Solan described the current situation in Seattle as “absolute chaos.” The officers in the Seattle Police Department, Solan says, love this city and love their job.
“But it’s quite clear that there about 100 to 150 people that are holding all of us and our city hostage by their criminal actions,” he said. “… If we had a more forceful voice condemning this from our elected officials, from the council, I think that they could have a big hand in having these criminal actors stop their domestic terrorist acts against police, against our community.”
Other cities, including Detroit, have pointed to Seattle as an example of what they are trying to avoid.
“It’s clear that if there’s a void in leadership, when you have feckless leaders who are not serving for the greater good of our community, there’s going to be a vacuum, and people will fill that void,” Solan said. “And clearly there are domestic terrorists, criminal actors that are filling that void, and they’re emboldened by the feckless leadership.”
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Solan says he’s fearful for what comes next if the current path continues.
“Is there going to be gunplay?” he asked. “Are there going to be more incendiary devices targeting police officers, targeting our community? We need leadership, and we need it fast.”
Listen to the Dori Monson Show weekday afternoons from noon – 3 p.m. on KIRO Radio, 97.3 FM. Subscribe to the podcast here.
