By Michelle Naranjo
At times, the pace of deaths of Black people at the hands of law enforcement officers is relentless, and the rate just seems to escalate.
Within the hour of the guilty verdict of Derek Chauvin in the murder of George Floyd, a 16-year old girl was shot and killed in Columbus, Ohio, by a police officer.
President Biden’s commitment to the family of the bill’s namesake that he will push the Senate to pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021 (HR 1280) is a tall order. There are about 18,000 individual law enforcement organizations in the United States. Using federal funding as incentive to curb the rash of unnecessary violence and death against individuals, especially those of color disproportionately affected, is the goal.
Still, its practicality leaves many of the GOP senate cold because they insist that the police would not be supportive.
As Phillip Atiba Goff, co-founder of the Center for Policing Equity, noted to NPR’s Dave Davies of Fresh Air this week, several police forces and communities are seeking help from his organization to dismantle the white supremacy inherent in law enforcement agencies. One such community trying to change is Ithaca, New York, which has organized its Department of Community Solutions and Public Safety, unarmed officials that will assist armed officers in non-violent situations. Armed police officers would not make routine traffic stops, which can escalate quickly when a badge and a gun are involved. Ithaca’s local police union is in favor of the new department.
Goff believes such programs address policing policies developed during a time when the foundations of law enforcement were built on controlling the movement of Black people. While opponents decry this as “defunding” the police, Goff equates it to a quiet, longstanding movement to defund schools and health insttutions in Black and brown communities.
As the Senate begins to hash out which details of HR 1280 will be kept and which will get tossed, or compromised, Republican Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina has offered a compromise he thinks will convert many of his Republican colleagues. His compromise would lose the provision to eliminate qualified immunity, which essentially protects individual police officers from criminal prosecution for any misconduct, thus leaving the responsibility with the law enforcement agencies themselves. Scott’s hope is this would give law enforcement agencies the obligation of stepping up to make sure bad police officers are not kept on the force.
This compromise is a horrible idea, and it has now been revealed that the Department of Justice is considering additional prosecution of Derek Chauvin, who has been accused of beating a Black teenager to unconsciousness and kneeling on his neck for 17 minutes, in 2017. And the Minneapolis Police Department are said to have known about this, yet Chauvin never was investigated. Law enforcement needs to be re-oriented toward focusing on public health and safety. HR 1280 would ensure that focus changes.