US George Floyd protests: Donald Trump signs executive order on police reform

Donald Trump signs an executive order to encourage better police practices while reiterating a hard line on law and order.

US President Donald Trump speaks prior to signing an executive order on police reform in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington.

President Trump offered support for curtailing police abuses while reiterating a hard line on law and order, as Democratic and Republican lawmakers were set to proceed with competing legislative proposals in the face of nationwide calls for law-enforcement overhauls.

Mr Trump signed an executive order urging police departments to adopt stricter use-of-force standards and create a database to track officer misconduct. He also said he would work with Congress on further steps, which he didn’t specify. While striking a conciliatory tone at times, the president firmly expressed support for law-enforcement personnel, saying only a “tiny” percentage abuse power and rejected calls to strip police departments’ funding.

“We need to bring law enforcement and communities closer together, not to drive them apart,” Mr Trump said, while promising justice for families who lost loved ones in police killings. He added that Americans “demand law and order. They may not say it, they may not be talking about it, but that’s what they want.”

White House officials said the order was crafted in consultation with police and the families of victims killed by police, some of whom met privately with the president on Tuesday. The signing ceremony was in the Rose Garden, not far from an area outside the White House grounds that has drawn daily protests spurred by the May 25 killing of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis.

Mr Trump was flanked by law-enforcement officials as he signed the order.

The executive order has three main components: establishing an independent credentialing process to spur departments to adopt the most modern use-of-force practices; creation of a database to track abusive officers that can be shared among different departments; and placing social-service workers to accompany officers on nonviolent-response calls to deal with issues such as drug addiction and homelessness. Chokeholds would be banned under the recommended standards, Mr Trump said, unless an officer’s life is at risk.

Though not a mandate, officials said the credentialing process and other steps would push police departments to innovate in order to obtain discretionary federal grant money. Democrats said that was insufficient.

“Unfortunately, this executive order will not deliver the comprehensive meaningful change and accountability in our nation’s police departments that Americans are demanding,” said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.). He said that Mr Trump needs to commit to backing legislation that makes it easier to hold police officers accountable for abuses.

The president of the national Fraternal Order of Police, Patrick Yoes, said that the organisation had reviewed the executive order and supports its goals.

“It strikes a great balance between the vital need for public and officer safety, and the equally vital need for lasting, meaningful and enforceable police reform,” Mr Yoes said.

On Capitol Hill, Democrats and Republicans have indicated they support collating nationwide data on the use of force and bolstering training programs for police officers, among other measures. Democrats have coalesced around a sweeping package expected to be approved by the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday before a vote of the full House later this month.

The Democratic bill would make it easier to prosecute police officers accused of misconduct by changing consideration of intent when an officer violates a victim’s constitutional rights. The bill would also curb the “qualified immunity” protection established by the Supreme Court that shields police and other officials from legal liability for actions they take on the job.

Democrats would also ban the use of chokeholds, which are forbidden by many police departments but not by federal law, and prohibit no-knock warrants in drug cases, which allow police to storm a residence without first announcing their presence. They propose setting up a public national registry of police misconduct, maintained by the Justice Department, to include complaints against an officer, disciplinary actions and firing records.

Both Democrats and a group in the Senate led by Sen. Tim Scott (R., S.C.) would collect more data around when police officers use force. Mr. Scott, who said he plans to unveil his legislation on Wednesday, will also propose training to help police de-escalate tense situations to avoid the use of force and establish a records database that police departments can access to make better hiring decisions. Both bills would also make lynching a federal hate crime by establishing a new criminal civil-rights violation for the act of lynching in the US Criminal Code.

US President Donald Trump shows his signature on an Executive Order on Safe Policing for Safe Communities, in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington.

But the Senate GOP bill stops short of many provisions in the Democratic bill. Mr Scott said his bill won’t limit legal protections for police officers. He said his aim is to collect data on the use of no-knock warrants, rather than banning them. And the proposal isn’t expected to target a program that enables police agencies to receive surplus military equipment.

Mr Scott’s group was expected to meet again later Tuesday and if they have a consensus around their bill, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) is likely to announce Wednesday morning that the chamber would consider it soon, Sen. Roy Blunt (R., Mo.) told reporters.

Mr McConnell said he would take the procedural steps to bring the Senate bill when ready to the floor, but emphasised that Democrats would have to provide some of the 60 votes needed for it to advance. He also poured cold water on some of the House bill’s changes to federal law.

“It’s basically typical Democratic overreach to try to control everything in Washington,” he said of the Democratic plan. “We have no interest in that.” Some Republican senators said they had hoped to see more substantial changes to policing laws than were expected in Mr Scott’s bill.

“I’ve been disappointed that we haven’t as a Republican conference been more aggressive here, and I’ll be disappointed here if we don’t get support behind reforming qualified immunity,” said Sen. Mike Braun (R., Ind.). He said he would introduce this week legislation limiting qualified immunity.

The Wall Street Journal