Crime in some liberal cities has become so bad that thefts are leading retail chains to close businesses and warn about the consequences of organized retail thefts. But you know crime is particularly bad when a business closes an otherwise profitable location out of concerns for safety.
In-N-Out is closing its only location in Oakland, a location the company says has still been profitable. “This location remains a busy and profitable one for the company, but our top priority must be the safety and wellbeing of our Customers and Associates — we cannot ask them to visit or work in an unsafe environment,” the company’s chief operating officer said. “Our Customers and Associates are regularly victimized by car break-ins, property damage, theft, and armed robberies.”
You can’t try to deflect blame on this by blaming corporate greed or saying that crime is just an excuse for the company to shut down an underperforming location, as many activists have tried to do with Walgreens in San Francisco or grocery stores in Washington, D.C. — unless you think In-N-Out is lying about its Oakland location being profitable. Then again, that closing In-N-Out location is just two miles from Oakland International Airport, where rental car companies have told people not to use gas stations in the area for their own safety.
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What can’t be denied is that burglaries and car thefts are the highest they have been in Oakland in a decade, and the city has seen more than 100 homicides for four years in a row. It can all be traced back to the pro-criminal activist voters put in charge of the Alameda County justice system. Pamela Price does not believe in incarcerating violent criminals and believes that letting them free does not affect the crime rate in any way.
These are consequences that liberal city voters have brought on themselves. Pro-criminal district attorneys invite more crime thanks to their soft-on-crime policies, leading businesses to close due to safety and causing the quality of life to continue to deteriorate. Oakland has done this to itself, and the bleeding will continue until voters rectify their terrible decision.