All across America, there is a new sense of entitlement that, unfortunately, has energized the criminal element. Liberal Democrats have infiltrated far too many American cities and have weakened and, in some cases, obliterated the justice systems. Revolving-door arrests, where criminals are placed right back on the streets, have placed honest, hard-working citizens in danger.
One area where crime has literally ballooned out of control is in retail theft. In some cities the losses have become so great that well-known retailers such as Wal-Mart, Target, Nordstrom, and Kohls, just to name a few, have been forced to close down and leave. In other cases, retailers have been forced to put almost everything behind plexiglass, which forces honest consumers to be inconvenienced while a sales associate is contacted to open something that should not need to be locked down.
In this new wave of emboldened theft, no retailer is safe. Believe it or not, a huge black market has developed for cleaning products. Brand-name items have literally been cleaned off of the shelves by unrepentant thieves. Again, the result is that honest people suffer. A Giant Foods store located in Washington, D. C., has been forced to remove Tide laundry detergent, Colgate toothpaste and Advil pain reliever from their store shelves. In addition, they were forced to hire more security, lock up items that are easily stolen, block off secondary entrances, move products popular with thieves out of reach, limit the number of checkout items and then still check customer receipts at the door.
In an interview with the Washington Post, Giant President Ira Kress stated the unfortunate truth:
We want to continue to be able to serve the community, but we can’t do so at the level of significant loss or risk to our associates that we have today. At this particular store, it’s actually worse, not better, and we’ve invested a significant amount of money here, even more security here than any other store.
I don’t want to do this. I’d like to sell those products, but the reality is that Tide is not a profitable item in this store. In many instances, people stock the product and within two hours it’s gone, so it’s not on the shelf anyway.
Diane Hicks is Giant Foods' senior vice president of operations. She lamented to the Post her disappointment in not being able to properly serve their honest customers: “We have no other choice. I’ve been leaving it out for our customers, and unfortunately it just forces all the crime to come to us.”
The losses are shocking. Retail theft losses swelled to $112.1 billion in 2022, up 19% from $93.9 billion the year before. Those somber numbers come from the 2023 National Retail Security Survey, released in late September by the Loss Prevention Research Council and the National Retail Federation. Earnings out this summer showed a widening impact from "inventory shrinkage,” which is retail speak for theft. In the last quarter, several large chains, including Target and Dick's Sporting Goods, listed rising theft as the reason for their earnings shortfalls.
Now, with the holidays approaching, you have to ask yourself, will stores be reporting record sales amounts or record amounts of theft. It’s bad enough that that under the Biden administration inflation is picking the pockets of Americans. Even things like traditional food items for our Thanksgiving dinner will cause many people to wince, a subject that Catherine Salgado covers in depth in her column.
So, honest American citizens are getting hit from multiple angles. Paying more for everyday items, not being able to find certain items in the store, being inconvenienced by additional security measures, and being exposed to an emboldened criminal element while shopping.
Emboldened may not be a strong enough word. In certain states, if the items that are stolen total less than $1,000, they aren’t prosecuted, resulting in some thieves taking calculators with them to ensure they stay within the “illegal limit.”
Also, many stores, not wanting to risk employee safety, have instructed their workers not to interfere or attempt to stop someone from stealing. So, it has become common place to see videos of criminals walking out with cart loads or armloads of merchandise without any resistance. If offenders are willing to do this any time of the year on a nondescript weekday, imagine how much easier it will be for them when stores are more crowded during the holidays and it’s easier to blend in.
As a society, this can’t become acceptable. These thefts don’t occur in a vacuum. Retailers have no choice but to raise prices to counter their losses in theft, which means that, once again, it’s the law-abiding citizens who are punished.
Liberals are undermining the lives of honest Americans. The solution is to eliminate them from all positions of decision-making and power. Otherwise, they will reduce us to third-world status, doing so under the guise of diversity, equity, and inclusion. In reality their agenda is segregation, lawlessness, and exclusion.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member