U.S. Illinois Senator Mark Kirk is repudiating a plan he floated earlier this year to do a mass arrests of 18,000 gang members. IPR’s Robert Wildeboer reports:
Senator Kirk made headlines at the end of May when he proposed arresting 18 thousand members of the gangster disciples.
Congressman Bobby Rush told the Chicago Sun-Times it was "headline grabbing" and a quote, "upper-middle-class, elitist white boy solution to a problem he knows nothing about."
KIRK: On that, Bobby Rush has been somewhat correct in his criticism of me that a mass arrest all at once is not actually that practical.
Kirk says his proposal was a reaction to the outrage he experienced due to the death of Hadiya Pendleton, the young woman who was shot and killed shortly after participating in Presidential inauguration festivities in Washington, D.C.
Kirk says he’s still focused on whittling away at the gangster disciples and is pushing for $500 million in extra federal spending on law enforcement.