AMAC Exclusive – By Shane Harris
![homeless-san-francisco homelessness in San Francisco](https://static-asset.amac.us/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/15100118/homeless-san-francisco.jpg)
As Chinese President Xi Jinping arrives in San Francisco on Wednesday, he will be greeted with a sight few city residents have seen in recent memory: sparkling clean streets devoid of trash, homeless encampments, and drug addicts – all of which have been cleared out and hidden from view in anticipation of the communist dictator’s visit.
As the New York Post reported late last week, “Drug addicts, dealers and homeless who have plagued San Francisco’s downtown have miraculously disappeared this week as the city cleans up for a huge international event,” referring to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit. Xi and President Joe Biden will meet on the sidelines of the summit on Wednesday, where they are expected to discuss trade, sanctions, and questions about the future of Taiwan amid escalating tensions.
City officials focused on clearing out San Francisco’s most notorious neighborhoods for open-air drug deals and crowded tent encampments, including the Tenderloin and South of Market. Viral videos shared on social media in recent years have shown dozens of fentanyl and heroin users passed out on the streets in broad daylight there, with used needles littering sidewalks and gutters. The problem became so bad outside the Nancy Pelosi Federal Building in August that employees were told to work from home “for the foreseeable future.”
But a few days before the start of the APEC summit, fliers appeared across several city blocks notifying people living on the streets that “the City and County of San Francisco will be resolving the encampment.” Residents described how police and other city officials soon began “herding” homeless populations to other parts of the city far from the summit and then put up fencing to prevent more encampments from popping up.
San Francisco was clearly trying to give itself a facelift ahead of Xi’s visit, something Governor Gavin Newsom even openly admitted, saying it’s “true” that Democrats are “just cleaning up this place because all those fancy leaders are coming to town.” After years of allowing the city’s homelessness and drug addiction problem to grow and fester unchecked, liberal leaders rushed to hide the mess they created in order to impress one of America’s top rivals.
In so doing, Newsom and the other liberal leaders in San Francisco have unintentionally confirmed that they fully understand the chaos and squalor running rampant in their city. After abandoning the taxpayers who live in his state for years, Newsom is now doing everything he can to impress foreign elites flying in on private jets to rub elbows with the rich and powerful. Xi Jinping, it seems, is worthy of such effort, but Democrats’ own citizens and voters are not.
Such a ridiculous and shameful façade seems like something straight out of North Korea – and indeed in many ways it is.
Back in the 1950s, the North Korean government built a village called Kijong-dong, roughly translated to “Peace Village,” within its half of the Demilitarized Zone on the border with South Korea. The regime claimed it was an idyllic 200-family collective farm, complete with colorful high-rises and western-style suburban neighborhoods. Loudspeakers blared anti-Western propaganda for 20 hours a day in an attempt to persuade South Koreans to defect until both countries agreed to stop the broadcasts in 2004.
For observers across the 38th Parallel, the Peace Village was always a laughable farce, a real-life example of the famous “Potemkin village” of Russian legend. Some of the buildings have painted-on windows, while others appear to only be exterior shells with no interior walls or floors. Electric lights operate on timers, and the town is eerily devoid of activity.
Yet every day, South Korean and American military officials across the DMZ watch as North Korean workers sweep the streets and repaint buildings. Kim Jong Un appears determined to maintain the charade of the Peace Village no matter how ridiculous it seems to the rest of the world.
The front put up by San Francisco is equally unconvincing, and is in some ways even more embarrassing than if the city had simply allowed the encampments to remain. The added attention brought on by clearing out the “undesirable” residents has only further highlighted the shameful failure of anyone in power in San Francisco to do anything about the homelessness and drug addiction crisis.
The incident is also easy fodder for China’s state propaganda arm, which is always looking for opportunities to criticize the United States – and in this case, they have a legitimate reason to do so.
The one positive from this saga is that Democrat leaders and voters may finally be inspired to take real action – although the former seems far less likely than the latter. Even though San Francisco only moved its homeless population from one part of the city to another, the government nonetheless proved that it has always had the capability to address the homelessness problem. It is the will to do so that has been lacking.
What some enterprising local investigative journalists have termed the “homelessness industrial complex” may also start receiving unwanted attention. Every year, hundreds of millions of tax dollars are funneled through nonprofits that ostensibly exist to fix the homelessness crisis but have a vested financial interest in perpetuating it. A report from the Washington Examiner in September shed some light on corrupt city officials receiving kickbacks from nonprofits funded by taxpayer dollars to address homelessness.
It is possible the shame of resorting to creating a fake portrayal of a once great American city to impress foreign leaders might inspire more such inquiries from the media and perhaps even some accountability from elected officials – something that will never happen in North Korea.
Until then, however, it seems Democrats will continue trying to hide the problems they’ve created rather than solving them.
Shane Harris is a writer and political consultant from Southwest Ohio. You can follow him on Twitter @ShaneHarris513.
Think of Newsom and the other Democrats in California as cleaning up the house before the boss comes over for dinner. The Democrat Party absolutely adores the CCP’s form of government, and they idolize President Xi. So, it is only natural that they would want to temporarily clean up SF for a visit by their idol. Residents of SF should get too accustomed to the clean streets and lack of homeless everywhere. No doubt once President Xi leaves SF to return to Beijing, the city of SF will return to the filth and squalor that the Democrats have cultivated as the norm.
They are only temporarily “Hidden from View” . . . They’ll be back as soon as the the visiting dignitaries are gone . Gov. Newsom is a phony hypocrite who is destroying the best state with his dumb policies! . . . I ought to know, I’ve lived here since late 1991. . . . God help us if this Clown tries to become President!
We need more people like Sarah Huckabee kicking them out instead of inviting them in.
The CCP has photos and videos of the squalor on the streets of San Francisco. They know more of what goes on in this open border country than the local politicians. They didn’t even have to send a recon balloon overhead to see this mess.
Newsom does nothing but strut around looking for adulation. Winter rains coming…how ’bout finding a way to store that water for the future? Wildfires always a threat? Has anything been done to reduce risks? When are Californians going to wake up? And America will be lost if he is ever elected President.
No kidding! Now they’re kissing the enemies behind and bringing them into our country. All these foreigners should not be allowed here, if we get attacked we’re going to get destroyed. So why do we keep talking about these Democrats instead of eradicating them from office.
ole Joe and his regime don’t care about the homeless or the rest of the American people if they are not for him or with him. SF will be back in a month like before this meeting. Sign of respect was the reason for the cleanup. No it was to make ole Joe look like a leader. His plan with meeting Xi is to get better relations like they can call one another on the phone. Wow does anyone believe that? General Millie picked up the phone to tell Xi I will warn you if Trump starts an attack. We are being snowed by a weak demented POTUS every day. He has got to go. Think about this, this man has his hand on the nuclear button. In a demented rage, which we have seen so many off by him, could start the third world war. The meeting is like the cleaned street a farce.
So they could have had a clean city years ago but they chose not to? And all it took was a visit from the Wuhan the Pooh….
It’s very sad that California politicians do not care for the safety and quality of life of Californians. However, it’s even sadder that many of the Californians themselves do not expect their politicians to be concerned with such every day matters. For example, I have several close California relatives who yell at my wife and me, whenever we dare point out that many of their politicians are more concerned with the rights of illegals, druggies, and alternative sex individuals than the safety and welfare of law-abiding citizens. One of them is such a loose cannon that he thinks that all Californians who do not agree with the far left agenda should move to states that are more conservative in nature. The ironic thing about this nonsense is that all of our relatives lead daily lives that are very materially comfortable and the ones with children are model parents who offer their offspring comfort and safety. The disconnect between how our relatives actually live and the political and social teachings of their Marxist politicians is dumbfounding.
Reminds one of East Berlin where the commies had windows, and shelves of shops stocked, streets all clean and nice, and the farther out from the town center you went you would see gray buildings, empty shop windows and shelves, long lines, and bullet holes in the walls from WWII. Socialist/Commies are as Socialist/Commies do! Nuisance cleaning up his pad by shoving the undesirables under his couch, and into his proverbial skeleton closet while his owner is in town is part and parcel of the communist serf scheme where the little communist bows to the big communist, …or else!
What is really sad is that people are just now starting to figure this out. What does it say about you that you must be used and abused for years before you start, I stress start, waking up?
The one thing I pray for and wish that the American people would wake up and see what the crooked politicians in every state and our federal are doing to us. They don’t care about us as long as they get what they want.If the American people do wake up and stop what’s going on, America will be great again but I don’t see that happening !!!!!!!
Shows the utter disregard Democrat politicians have for the people they represent! That idiot Newsome is too busy trying to raise his profile to be President to be bothered by serving his people.
Democrats are trying to usher in the New World Order!! No, they (nor any politician) don’t really care about anyone but themselves!!! They spit shined the city for the Dictator of China but why can’t they spit shine it permanently??? I live in a city of less than 100,000 population and we have a lot of homeless here!! I don’t understand why the homeless crisis isn’t more important to our politicians!! We look like a third world country until some Chinese dignitary comes to visit!!! Our government couldn’t care less if we all were homeless and starving!!!
WE still have NO Long Range water storage system coming winter storms ahead.
Water drains into the sea vs storage for use later
City, county wide
& need to update the Grid
El Rushbo was correct when he said, “liberals talk about how many people are ON government handouts, while Conservatives talk about how many don’t NEED handouts because they have found jobs!”
It isn’t that California Democraps care about EITHER foreign elites or California residents. They just want to be well thought of.
Yup they are and always will be more concerned about optics over failing policy.
Have you thanked a Democrat today and every day.
I wonder how the people who are living where the camps have been moved to feel about it. Now they have to lock down their properties and supervise their children and other family members closely to ensure that they are safe. There’s no doubt that these encampments will reappear in downtown SF as soon as the “Summit” is over. It’s a total farce and shows how little politicians care about their constituents.
The reason politicians prefer the elites over the working class is simple. The elites have the spare money to donate to their campaign funds while the working schnooks have to use their hard earned money to pay for their family’s living expenses.
I hope California voters remember this and vote the democrats out in November 2024 but I won ‘t hold my breath.
Newscum needs to go. Vote his sorry butt out please. Although I do believe he did NOT win the last election…..it’s called FRAUD and the demonrats are very good at that. Look in DC…same crap happened there.
More correctly, ALL Democrats, not just CA democrats.
Gavin Newsom is the living embodiment of ‘white privilege’: born to an elite political family, whiter than Sen. Wears-Long-Sweaters Warren, all doors opened for him. How could any DEI/CRT true believer ever vote for this supreme white patriarch? Newsom – along with the wealthy executives who kiss Xi’s pooh-bear bottom to become even wealthier – is a ‘Jinping Quisling’. Each of these traitors should be branded – via photoshop – with a scarlett ‘Xi’ on his/her forehead.
Is this visit by Communist Xi so the democrats can get China’s OK to give money in 2024 for the democrats to run newsom instead of sleepy joe against Trump??
If they could clean it up for the Chinese they could clean it up for the everyday residents. Why didn’t they?
California hasn’t been called “the land of the fruits and nuts” for no reason. Unfortunate because it is a beautiful state. Also, unfortunate because the ultra liberals have taken the common sense conservatives down with them. The liberal California mind set has spread like a cancer across all parts of America due to folks moving away from California. As they say, liberalism is a mental illness. Sorry to offend some of you in California but it seems to be true.
Another case of “out of sight, out of mind”; if you don’t SEE the problem it must not exist! But I love how Newsome talks about SFs problems as if he had nothing to do with it… like a kid denying they stole chocolate with it smeared around his face!
This reminds me of a company I worked for years ago who’s home office was 100 miles from the branch operation I worked at. It’s was strictly a NO SMOKING policy company branch shop. The branch boss and his subordinates were all heavy smokers. So, a informant snitch at the home office would call the branch boss every time, to tell him that the owner/boss is on his way up to the branch shop for an inspection. So, the branch boss and his goons would order the whole place cleaned and all smoking paraphernalia gotten rid of out of sight. The owner/boss would come up for the visit. But as soon as the owner/boss left to go back to the home office, the branch boss would light up and start smoking with his feet on his desk. All the smoking paraphernalia would come back out. The smoking would continue and so would the cat mouse behavior with the owner/boss. The no smoking policy would not be obeyed and if you ratted them out, you lost your job.
In the months leading up to the 2020 elections and in the years since tons of references have been made toward democrats who hate Trump as having TDS. Now I believe we have democrats who support the situation in California as it implodes around them. It needs an acronym, which my brain is not putting together today…help.