Republican congressional candidate for New Jersey’s 9th District, William “Billy” Prempeh, is showing his support for men and women in law enforcement by giving them sandwiches.
Prempeh started his “Hero for Heroes” initiative by personally delivering sandwiches to all of the police officers in his district.
Prempeh said he wanted to show his gratitude for the police during a time with a lot of mixed reactions about law enforcement.
“What inspired me to do this was, the police. They don’t really get much of a good response these days. I’m real grateful for a lot of the things that they’re doing inside of our community,” Prempeh told Fox News.
Prempeh cited the “Defund the Police” movement as one of the main motivations behind the project.
“I wanted to let them know that that not everybody believes that…In fact, most of the people that I know are totally against that idea of defunding the police,” he said.
Prempeh used New Jersey’s neighbor as an example of why defunding the police doesn’t work.
“It didn’t work in New York, and it led to lots of crime increasing in the city of New York…I see the same thing happening in Paterson as well.”
Prempeh visited 35 municipalities and delivered 1,230 sandwiches throughout the initiative.
“We just decided to hook them up with some lunch…I told them, if you had lunch, throw it out because I got it,” Prempeh said. The response was overwhelmingly positive from law enforcement and the community.
If elected, Prempeh said he will continue to support the police with funding, resources, and hiring the best officers for the job.
“First thing’s first, getting the police officers the funding and the gear that they need…I see what’s going on in the Paterson Police Department. There’s like light bulbs hanging off the ceiling and water dripping…it’s a really bad set of conditions,” he explained.
Prempeh said that the initiative was so rewarding he might make it a yearly event.
“I just wanted to put a smile on their face and let them know that…they still have support and that I really love everything that they’re doing. It was just our way of saying thank you,” he said.
The GOP candidate lost in 2020’s general election to Democratic candidate Bill Pascrell. Pempreh won nearly 32% of the votes to Pascrell’s 66%.
