Steve Hilton walked through MacArthur Park and its surrounding alleys on Tuesday, stepping past discarded needles, drug paraphernalia and homeless people sleeping on the sidewalks of one of Los Angeles’s most troubled public spaces. The Republican candidate for California governor used the visit to target taxpayer-funded nonprofits that distribute clean drug supplies through harm reduction programs, framing the park as proof of a broader state failure on homelessness and addiction.
Video and photographs from the tour showed Hilton walking past a woman sleeping in an alley and speaking to reporters near a person asleep on the sidewalk. As reported by the New York Post, Hilton called the conditions he witnessed “a moral failure” and described the area as a “taxpayer-funded drug market.” He argued that harm reduction programs prolong addiction rather than help people escape it, saying free crack pipes and needles are handed out to drug addicts while nonprofit CEOs make millions of dollars a year.
Hilton said harm reduction programs keep people addicted and that he would end them if elected, according to the same report. He has previously described seeing crack pipes, injection drug use and people folded over on fentanyl in broad daylight in the area, and also discussed homelessness spending.
A Federal Raid About Five Months Before the Visit
Hilton’s tour came after federal and local investigators carried out a drug raid in MacArthur Park and other Southern California locations, leading to the arrests of 18 suspects, according to ABC7. Investigators executed search warrants in MacArthur Park, San Gabriel, Calabasas and South Los Angeles. ABC7 reported that authorities seized 19 kilos of fentanyl they said was destined for the park, while a separate Justice Department account described roughly 18 kilograms of fentanyl recovered at one defendant’s Calabasas residence; the two figures were not reconciled in available reporting…