Controversial recruiting a volunteer force for emergencies.

0:00 Speaker 1 With us today is Bruce Blakeman, the county executive for a Nassau County, and Bruce Blakeman is doing a lot of things that he keep his constituents safe. Bruce Blakeman, Welcome to the Catch round Table this Sunday morning. And I read somewhere last week that you are going to be deputizing some people to protect their homes and protect

0:26 their neighbors. Tell us what you’re doing.

0:30 Speaker 2 Sure, so, John, I have the power as county executive to declare an emergency at which time I could if I chose to activate people to serve as special deputy sheriffs. So in anticipation of potentially having to do that and hoping that I never have to do it, I created a list of people that will go through training and

0:58 they would serve as provisional special deputy sheriffs in the event that there was some kind of dire emergency where we already had all hands on deck and we needed reinforcements. So primarily these individuals would be protecting infrastructure such as hospitals, utilities, government buildings, mosques, churches, synagogues, things of that nature. They would not be going out on patrol and I want

1:30 to stress that would only be in an emergency. So in the event there was a superstorm, sandy, or let’s say the earthquake was worse, or a blackout or whatever situation would put us in a circumstance where we would need additional help rather than scramble at the last minute, all I’ve done is just pre qualify people and create

1:54 a list or a database of people that would be willing to serve and people who were qualified to serve, most of which are former law enforcement and military veterans. So it’s nothing more than a list in a database.

2:08 God forbid, there should be such an emergency understood.

2:11 Speaker 1 How many people do you anticipate deputizing.

2:16 Speaker 2 Well, I think primarily we’d like to create a database of one hundred individuals. But it is a process that they have to go through. They have to take extensive training and firearms. They have to take training in the penal laws and the use of deadly force, as well as other types of training measures. So and you’re going

2:44 to be.

2:44 Speaker 1 They’re reporting to the Sheriff’s Department, are going to be reporting to the Nasau County Police Department.

2:53 Speaker 2 They would be under the direction of the Nasau County.

2:55 Speaker 1 Sheriff, gotcha, there’s some other things that are happening in Nasau County. You’re going to allow LGBT competing girls’ sports? Tell us what’s going on.

3:10 Speaker 2 Yeah, it’s really just protecting women’s sports. We have a executive order that I find whereby it states very simply that if you identify yourself as a female team, women or girls, or a league that’s women or girls, that biological males cannot play. They can play against other males, they can play in the co ed league, they can

3:39 form their own transgender league. But what we have seen throughout the United States is men who then claim that they’re transgender women trying to compete in women’s sports. Women are getting injured. It’s unfair competition and it’s unsafe. So it’s just common sense. And I think a lot of people are behind us on this because we’re starting to

4:05 see the various women’s organizations now standing up and saying that it is just common sense and that they want to be protected. They don’t want biological males who are bigger, faster, and stronger competing against girls, and.

4:21 Speaker 1 That sounds like common sense, and I understand the Attorney General’s office is a thinking of suing you as has been suing you.

4:31 Speaker 2 Well. The Attorney General issued a cease and desist order via letter to me, and we then decided that this needed to be adjudicated by the courts, so we bought a lawsuit in federal court. We are pursuing that lawsuit.

4:50 We asked for temporary restraining order. The judge denied our application. I don’t know why. It just merely preserves the status quo, because you know, for the last fifty years we’ve been trying to increase the rights of women to compete in sports, and that’s just what we’re doing here. We’re not trying to exclude transgender athletes. There are other avenues that they

5:16 can use to play sports and compete, but they shouldn’t be stealing championships from women who have worked their whole lives to be good at their sport. And they shouldn’t be competing with women whereby they’re putting women in danger, like those young girls who were playing basketball up in New England and the coach of the girls team took

5:35 his team morph the court because a couple of them got injured by a biological male who was much bigger than they were so again, this is just common sense. I can’t imagine why people feel the necessity that biological males have to compete against females.

5:55 Speaker 1 Agreed well, Bruce Blakeman, thank you for coming on this Sunday morning, and uh uh I think I think you’re resonating common sense and uh we’ll catch up keep us informed of what’s going on.

6:08 Speaker 2 Thanks so much, John, enjoy the rest of the day. Thank you.