Scott Walker is blaming cop killings on Obama's 'absence of leadership'

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published 13 September 2015

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) slammed President Barack Obama on Sunday for not being supportive enough of police officers. The presidential candidate chatted with CNN's Jake Tapper about his recent Hot Air editorial.

"We can not have any more of this idea that it's okay to go after law enforcement just because they wear a uniform and just because they have a badge," Walker said on State of the Union.

He also suggested Obama's "absence of leadership" is directly related to recent deaths of law enforcement officials, like the Houston-area deputy who was fatally shot while filling up his gas tank. Some have suggested that incident and others are due to the Black Lives Matter movement, which is designed to raise awareness about police brutality against black people. There's even been a Police Lives Matter rally in response.

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In his Sept. 2 editorial, Walker doesn't specifically call out Black Lives Matter, but he alludes to the activists when criticizing "demonstrations and chants":

Instead of hope and change, we've seen racial tensions worsen and a tendency to use law enforcement as a scapegoat. This kind of attitude has created a culture in which we all too often see demonstrations and chants where people describe police as "pigs" and call for them to be "fried like bacon." This inflammatory and disgusting rhetoric has real consequences for the safety of officers who put their lives on the line for us and hampers their ability to serve the communities that need their help. [Hot Air]

Watch Walker's full interview here.

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Julie Kliegman is a freelance writer based in New York. Her work has appeared in BuzzFeed, Vox, Mental Floss, Paste, the Tampa Bay Times and PolitiFact. Her cats can do somersaults.