(OPINION) DM – Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has denounced the NYPD’s new crime-fighting robot dog, appearing to accuse the department of racism for deploying the device for testing in only low-income communities of color.
The Democratic firebrand blasted the police department’s four-legged ‘Digidog’ in a succession of Thursday tweets, two days after the cyber hound was filmed responding to a home invasion in her home borough of the Bronx. ‘Shout out to everyone who fought against community advocates who demanded these resources go to investments like school counseling instead,’ she wrote.
‘Now robotic surveillance ground drones are being deployed for testing on low-income communities of color with under-resourced schools.’ Ocasio-Cortez then argued that police funding that allows for new technology like the Digidog would have better served the community if it had been allotted to programs for education or housing.
‘Please ask yourself: when was the last time you saw next-generation, world-class technology for education, healthcare, housing, etc consistently prioritized for underserved communities like this?’ she added in a follow-up tweet. Digidog, which was designed by Boston Dynamics and has a starting price of around $75,000, joined the NYPD last year. READ MORE
