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Attorney General William Barr said in a speech before the assembly at the Fraternal Order of Police Conference in New Orleans, "We must have zero tolerance for resisting police. This will save lives."

Barr said in the opening moments of his speech , "To my mind, there is no more noble profession than serving as a police officer. You put your own life and well-being on the line to protect your communities."

Barr said that law enforcement is "fighting an unrelenting, never-ending fight against criminal predators in our society. While there are battles won and lost each day, there is never a final resolution—a final victory is never in sight."

Barr's remarks also singled out local prosecutors for being soft on crime and accused them of making police officers' jobs more difficult.

"There is another development that is demoralizing to law enforcement and dangerous to public safety," Barr said. "That is the emergence in some of our large cities of district attorneys that style themselves as 'social justice' reformers, who spend their time undercutting the police, letting criminals off the hook, and refusing to enforce the law."

Barr added, "The anti-police narrative is fanning disrespect for the law.  In recent years, we have witnessed increasing toleration of the notion that it is somehow okay to resist the police."