By Adam Pagnucco.
Earlier this week, I wrote about a new county council memo outlining staffing problems in the Montgomery County Police Department (MCPD). This has been an escalating issue since 2019. On Monday, Police Chief Marc Yamada appeared before the council’s Public Safety Committee and identified one reason for the issues:
The county’s Defund the Police movement.
Here is what Yamada told the committee near the end of its meeting.
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Montgomery County Police Chief Marc Yamada.
And we talk about things that prevent people from seeking employment here in Montgomery County. Google the top reasons somebody might not want to come here. Google “defund Montgomery County police.” I mean, it is there. And our recruiters will tell us that’s the message they see. And it’s not so much we don’t want to work for the chief of police, we just don’t want to work for that environment. And that is all of us in this room. All of us go into that messaging. That we need officers here. We welcome you. We support you. And that’s not what they’re seeing all the time.
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Council Member Dawn Luedtke, who sits on the committee, replied, “I know that. And I know that makes a difference in what other, even adjacent, jurisdictions people choose to go to. That’s why I’m not even going to quote you back in saying it today because as an elected official, I’ve never said it and I’m not gonna say it and I didn’t say it in my prior career and not saying it now.”
That was pretty ballsy of the chief since Council Member Kristin Mink, another committee member, was sitting nearby. Mink was a ferocious Defund the Police advocate before she was elected but seems to have mellowed on the issue after calling a district commander asking for help with a flat tire. Mink did not respond to the comments by Yamada and Luedtke.
This was Mink’s stance on police funding just five years ago.
Following up on Yamada’s remarks, I googled “Defund Montgomery County police” and here is what I found.
There is a ton of content here, mostly on Mink and fellow Council Member Will Jawando. Both of them have expressed support for defunding in the past.
Here is what ChatGPT said when I asked it who wanted to defund police in MoCo.
Again, Mink and Jawando come up. This article on Mink’s defunding history is mentioned prominently by both ChatGPT and Google.
To be fair, neither council member still uses defunding rhetoric. The concept was not very popular years ago and a May 2025 Gallup poll found strong majorities of Americans (including Black Americans) have confidence in their local police forces. Jawando even posted photos of himself riding with police officers on Facebook last December.
Jawando now says he supports police.
I don’t know if Yamada is right about this, but here’s a thought. Results on Google and ChatGPT evolve as new content is published on the Internet. Suppose Mink and Jawando repeatedly declare their support for police and appreciation for their work. Such statements might circulate around the Internet and change the county’s image for police job-seekers. I’d be happy to print them. How about it, council members? Are you game?