The verdict in the Kate Steinle murder case is a slap in the face to every law-abiding American citizen.

Years of California leaders harboring illegal immigrants have led to this willful and awful occurrence in San Francisco — a killer walking free despite being in this country illegally, being deported five times, and despite being a seven-time convicted felon.

San Francisco’s “sanctuary city” policy is bringing shame upon the once-Golden State in a turn of events that President Trump Donald John TrumpBubba Wallace to be driver of Michael Jordan, Denny Hamlin NASCAR team Graham: GOP will confirm Trump's Supreme Court nominee before the election Southwest Airlines, unions call for six-month extension of government aid MORE called “disgraceful.”

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The worst part? It could have all been avoided.

To understand how we got here, one must understand how liberal politics have played out in California.

Progressives in California over the last 10 years have increasingly placed the so-called “rights” of illegal immigrants over the public safety of its residents.

San Francisco Mayor Edwin Lee once called illegal immigration “part of the DNA of the city.”

Even California’s Attorney General Xavier Becerra Xavier BecerraOVERNIGHT ENERGY: Trump casts doubt on climate change science during briefing on wildfires | Biden attacks Trump's climate record amid Western wildfires, lays out his plan | 20 states sue EPA over methane emissions standards rollback 20 states sue EPA over methane emissions standards rollback Investigation underway after bags of mail found dumped in Los Angeles-area parking lot MORE — the man responsible for upholding the law — is ironically for actually breaking federal immigration law.

Their choices have proven to have deadly consequences.

Whether it’s the case of Kate Steinle who was shot in the back while showing her dad the beautiful piers in San Francisco, or whether it was high school football star Jamiel Shaw’s life ending on the sidewalk in front of his house in South Central Los Angeles, California leaders have blood on their hands.

Public safety is the reason I left California at the end of 2012.

As Democrats promoted sanctuary city policies and Gov. Jerry Brown began his early prisoner release program of convicted felons, drug dealers and other offenders, I no longer felt safe as a single female walking home from work in California.

Now in California, 13,500 inmates are released early every month due to overcrowding. That’s an increase of 34 percent over just the last few years, according to the Los Angeles Times.

All of this comes at a time when illegal immigrant criminal activity is drowning the state’s resources. Already, approximately one-fourth of the prison inmate population are illegal immigrants being housed on the taxpayers’ dime.

While liberals often suggest that the illegal immigrant population is relatively low and therefore no threat to public safety, federal crime statistics show that a heavy percentage of inmates, criminal offenders and murderers are illegal immigrants. According to an op-ed earlier this year at The Hill, “a population of just over 3.5 percent residing in the U.S. unlawfully committed 22 percent to 37 percent of all murders in the nation.”

In the Kate Steinle murder case, we knew so little about the violent illegal immigrant offender that he was actually indicted under another name. Initially, he was reported to be Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez, but the name under which he was just acquitted last night is Jose Ines Garcia Zarate. It begs the question, if we can’t even verify a person’s true identity, should they really be in our country walking our streets among the public?

The evidence clearly shows that illegal immigrants's criminal activity increasingly places law-abiding American citizens at risk.

That an entire state would allow its residents to be placed beneath the rights of illegal criminal immigrants is a travesty. The fact that liberals even suggest that those who have no legal claim to residence here even have “rights” is a laughable premise to begin with.

The sad news is that with California now becoming a “sanctuary state” this problem will continue to grow, and the public safety will continue to be placed at risk.

When not corrected, history will repeat itself.

So, who will be the next Kate Steinle?

We don’t yet know her name, but you can bet that this scenario will undoubtedly and ever so tragically play out again on the national stage.

Jen Kerns served as the spokeswoman for the California Republican Party. A two-time appointee of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, she went on to serve as spokeswoman and communications director for the victorious Prop. 8 campaign in California, the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, Americans for Prosperity in California, and numerous rare successful Statewide races as a Republican press secretary. She departed California at the end of 2012 over public safety concerns.