POLICE/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “We need security. We can’t defund our police. And we can’t abolish our police. They want to abolish our police.
And as far as the surplus equipment, I have given out hundreds of millions of dollars. This is stuff that was sitting in storage houses all over the country. It wasn’t even old, but it was never going to be used again. It was gathering dust. And I gave it out to all of our police forces all over the country, saved many, many police lives and many lives, I think, period.
It was really — a lot of it was protective equipment. And I know that President Obama and Biden didn’t want to give it out. They thought it was terrible to give it out. It made the police look too strong. And I gave it out, and I have been thanked by every police department.”
-Donald Trump as quoted by Fox News, “Trump on violence in liberal cities, ‘brainwashed’ Joe Biden, response to COVID crisis, Supreme Court rulings,” foxnews.com, July 9, 2020