Minnesota Governor Tim Walz weighing in Wednesday on Minneapolis' Fourth of July night of chaos.
“The behavior's unacceptable,” said Walz at a press conference. “It is against the law, it's dangerous and as we've seen across the country, we cannot allow these to continue.”
Walz says Minneapolis has not requested the Minnesota National Guard to help with policing as has been called for by at least one city councilmember.
Walz adds that street racing, carjackings, and crime numbers overall are down since Minneapolis partnered with the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension and Minnesota State Patrol for help.
“We need to continue to build the city of Minneapolis, Hennepin County, and our surrounding jurisdictions need to continue to work together,” Governor Walz said. “And this is a multifaceted approach. We know this. This is about having the number of folks on the streets to do the work.
It's also about making sure there's opportunities back upstream to stop these incidents from happening originally.”
The governor did promise an increased presence of state policing to help the city going forward.
Minneapolis police responded to a very high volume of 911 calls on the Fourth, saying they did the best they could to keep up. Eight people are hospitalized following a shooting in Boom Island Park and there were several reports of people shooting off fireworks into others, cars, and open windows in downtown Minneapolis.
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