Rand Paul on Ferguson: ‘I Mostly Blame Politicians’

Sen. Rand Paul castigated politicians in an op-ed today about the unrest in Ferguson, Mo.

“In the search for culpability for the tragedy in Ferguson, I mostly blame politicians,” wrote the Kentucky Republican in Time.

“Michael Brown’s death and the suffocation of Eric Garner in New York for selling untaxed cigarettes indicate something is wrong with criminal justice in America,” Paul added. “The War on Drugs has created a culture of violence and put police in a nearly impossible situation.”

The war on drugs, Paul asserted, had often led to minorities feeling “targeted” by the government. “Three out of four people in jail for drugs are people of color,” he noted.

Paul also advocated different policy solutions to tackle poverty:

This message is not a racial one. The link between poverty, lack of education, and children outside of marriage is staggering and cuts across all racial groups. Statistics uniformly show that waiting to have children in marriage and obtaining an education are an invaluable part of escaping poverty.

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“Escaping the poverty and crime trap,” Paul wrote, “will require more than just criminal justice reform.”