Minnesota Dem lawmaker wants to study the 'benefits of shoplifting'

A Democrat Minnesota state lawmaker has called for a study to see if there is a "benefit of shoplifting and retail theft" while he was discussing the topic in a committee meeting on Thursday.

Democrat state Rep. Dave Pinto stated, "Yesterday, there was a presentation from a group seeking to change how we address organized retail theft, 

and I actually had not occurred to me to ask, it probably would have been good, it would have been good to make sure that they would study sort of the benefit of shoplifting and of retail theft because perhaps people are relying on that and sort of using that. Maybe it's, you know, assisting them in some way. These folks were describing people violating the law, but I suppose it could be useful to look into that."

"But ultimately it's a policy question, right? We do want to make sure when we have a law in place that we're enforcing it," he added. Pinto made the comments during a meeting surrounding the costs of employee misclassification. Many reacted negatively to his comments, which went viral on social media.

One X user said, "People should go shoplifting at Dave Pinto’s house. Then he can tell everyone how he benefits from that."

Another posted a picture of a Walgreens store that has locked up products, including its soap section. "Yes, Walgreens please let these people steal deodorant and Body wash again!" the user commented.

Another added, "The left is constantly inverting basic societal values. Racial animosity used to be bad, but now it's 'good' when attacking 'whiteness'. Sheltering kids from filth used to good, but now they have drag shows for children. Shoplifting used to be bad, but now it might be 'good'."