Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan dismissed Parkland activist and gun control advocate David Hogg during an event on Thursday night, arguing that Hogg’s radical policies bear no weight in reality.
Hogan, an anti-Trump Republican, flirted with the idea of a presidential run in this year’s election and is rumored to be considering a run in 2024.
Hogg insisted that Hogan does not care about helping minority communities because he supports law enforcement and has spoken out against efforts to defund the police, and because he has been critical of gun-control legislation.
“You seem very willing to invest in police and give them hundreds of millions of dollars, but when it comes to investing in these communities with these bills, you didn’t do that?” Hogg asked, according to Fox News.
Hogan agreed that the “root causes” of inner-city violence must be addressed by the state governments, but pointed out that the vast majority of inner-city residents support officials who are tough on crime.
“I can tell you that 90% of the residents of Baltimore City and 90% of the African Americans of Baltimore City supported my crime bills to crack down on the violent crime,” Hogan said. “So this is not just me having a different opinion than you, this is everyone in Baltimore having a different opinion than you.”
Hogan also pointed out that he’s invested more money in Baltimore than any other Maryland governor, whether that was through “record investments in education,” funding for job training, or investments into law enforcement.
He also helped spearhead the creation of the “Purple Line,” a new D.C. Metro line that will connect northeastern D.C. and parts of Maryland to the rest of the city.
These are tangible solutions to the real problems plaguing minority communities, unlike Hogg’s radical agenda, Hogan said.
Hogg would abolish police departments everywhere if he could, when the real solution is to increase funding for police departments so that officers receive better training, better tools and more access to resources, he added.
“It’s one of the worst ideas I’ve ever heard,” Hogan said of defunding the police in an interview with Fox News last week.
“If you want to go after the problems in inner cities and the violent crime and the murders, we’ve got to have more police,” he continued. “… If you want to try to recruit and have more diversity, you’ve got to invest more. If you want better training and better equipment and you want, you know, body cams and you want people to have the training and de-escalation, all of that takes money.”
Hogg evidently didn’t take Hogan’s criticism well, because he later accused Hogan via Twitter of “dodging questions.”
Hey If you live in Maryland I thought I would let you know that your governor spent about 30 minutes yesterday
– in the middle of a global pandemic – promoting his book at Harvard and dogging questions from @AMarch4OurLives— David Hogg 95 days (@davidhogg111) July 31, 2020
He also accused Hogan of “promoting his book” during the event, suggesting that Hogan’s appearance was unethical.
.@LarryHogan Is it ethical as a public official to be promoting your own book in the middle of a pandemic?
— David Hogg 95 days (@davidhogg111) July 31, 2020
After graduating last year from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, the site of the 2018 mass shooting, Hogg enrolled in Harvard, which initially had rejected his application but later retracted its decision amid a public outcry from the Left.
