Police Chiefs in blue cities are hired for one essential quality: political reliability. They must be totally committed Democrats, the more to the left the better and enforce nothing but Democrat policies.  They don’t have to know much, if anything, about law enforcement. They certainly don’t need to know anything about religion, though they are apparently expected to mix what they don’t know about religion with Democrat orthodoxy.

One such police chief is Brian O’Hara of Minneapolis. Minneapolis became infamous as ground zero for the 2020 “Summer of Love” following the drug abuse suicide by cop of George Floyd, a violent convicted felon who killed himself while resisting arrest. Democrats saw an opportunity to push virtually all their cherished narratives, Floyd became a leftist saint, and the Minneapolis City Council were pioneers of “Defund the Police” hysteria. 

They pushed out their black police chief, cut the police budget and surprise, surprise, crime skyrocketed. Within four years they lost 40% of the police force, hired O’Hara, and have been utterly unable to rehire enough qualified people. It turns out not many people want to be cops in a city whose downtown McDonald’s lock their doors during business hours.  

They are also repelled by spectacles like this:

During a press conference with Mayor Jacob Frey Tuesday, O’Hara lamented the “very, very difficult time” communities are experiencing because of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers operating in the area. He likened the scenario to Mary and Joseph traveling to Bethlehem before the first Christmas.

“It’s especially personal to me, having been raised a Catholic, to be in a Christian church this morning as we are approaching Christmas,” O’Hara said. 

“And I cannot help but think of what is happening in our city today and how that echoes with how outsiders have been treated for thousands of years. How Mary and Joseph themselves were considered outsiders and forced to stay in a barn.

“That’s what we’re getting ready to commemorate as Christians around the world while all of this fear is happening in our town,” he added.

Apparently Chief O’Hara didn’t pay much attention during his Catholic education, as Luke 1: 1-7 notes:  

At that time a proclamation was made by Caesar Augustus that all the inhabited world should be registered. This was the first census, undertaken while Cyrenius was governor of Syria and everybody went to the town of his birth to be registered. Joseph went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to David’s town, Bethlehem, in Judea, because he was a direct descendant of David, to be registered with his future wife, Mary, now in the later stages of her pregnancy. So it happened that it was while they were there in Bethlehem that she came to the end of her time. She gave birth to her first child, a son. And as there was no place for them inside the inn, she wrapped him up and laid him in a manger.

O’Hara compared Mary and Joseph to illegal immigrants, calling them “outsiders.” They weren’t. They, like all citizens of the Holy Land were traveling to be enrolled in the census. Comparing Mary and Joseph with illegal immigrants, and particularly the kinds of criminals ICE is removing from Minneapolis, is nonsensical and deceptive.  Is O’Hara truly that clueless about the historical facts surrounding Christ’s birth, or is he merely doing his duty to please his Democrat employers? In either case, he’s lying.

Graphic: Social Media Post

No one “forced” the holy family “to stay in a barn.” So many were traveling to be enrolled in the census, there were no available lodgings, so they stayed in a manger, which was not unheard of in those days, and was surely ordained by God to demonstrate Christ’s humble, very human beginnings as the Word became flesh as was foretold. O’Hara doesn’t know this? Many do know the truth:

Graphic: Social Media Post

In a comment to Fox News Digital, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson condemned O’Hara’s speech as “unconscionable.”

“It’s unconscionable that anyone would compare criminal illegal aliens to the Son of God,” Jackson said. “Law enforcement officials should enforce the law, not allow dangerous criminal illegal aliens to terrorize American communities while making absurd comparisons.”

This observation about Democrat’s warping of narrative is particularly apt:

Graphic: Social Media Post

The historical record is more than clear. Mary And Joseph weren’t “outsiders,” refugees or illegal immigrants. They were traveling to obey the law, not violate it. There is no comparison between them and contemporary illegals, and trying to make such a comparison is a sign of religious ignorance and potentially a willingness to warp the Scriptures for contemporary political ends. We’ve come to expect that from people like O’Hara.

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Mike McDaniel is a USAF veteran, classically trained musician, Japanese and European fencer, life-long athlete, firearm instructor, retired police officer and high school and college English teacher. He is a published author and blogger. His home blog is Stately McDaniel Manor.