US protests: Radical reforms to axe police departments
America’s mass protest movement is calling for radical reforms to slash police budgets and even disband entire forces
America’s mass protest movement is calling for radical reforms to slash police budgets and even disband entire forces in moves designed to restore confidence in law enforcement.
Minneapolis’s city council has voted to abolish the city’s police department entirely in the wake of George Floyd’s death last month.
In other cities, such as New York and Los Angeles, critics are demanding to “defund the police”: to force budget cuts and reappropriations that would bring about change.
And in congress, Democrats proposed nationwide reforms that would lower the legal threshold for police to face prosecution, including charges for use of excessive force.
“This movement of national anguish is being transformed into a movement of national action,” said house Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi.
Donald Trump and his allies seized upon the moves as “radical-left craziness” that would backfire and help him win re-election in November.
Latest polling, however, shows a drop in the President’s approval rating to a level seen at the same point in the electoral cycle for Jimmy Carter and George Bush Sr, who both ended up one-term presidents.
The CNN poll found a 14-point lead for Joe Biden, the Democratic presidential candidate, who visited the Floyd family privately before his funeral in Houston overnight (AEST).
Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey said he supported abolishing the police department and looked forward to “deciphering” what council members meant by such talk.
He said he favoured “a full-on cultural shift in how our Minneapolis Police Department and departments throughout the country function”.
Legislation drawn up by Democrats would ban chokeholds by federal police, establish a national database to track misconduct, end the transfer of military equipment to local forces, and require the use of body cameras and car dashboard cameras.
It would make it easier to hold federal police liable for civil rights abuses and for federal funds to be withheld from local forces who did not make reforms.
“The martyrdom of George Floyd made America experience a moment of national anguish as we grieve for the black Americans killed by police brutality,” Ms Pelosi said.
“We cannot settle for anything less than transformative structural change. This is a first step; there is more to come.”
New York mayor Bill de Blasio said he would move funds away from the police department and towards youth and social services. “We’re committed to seeing a shift of funding to youth services, to social services, that will happen literally in the course of the next three weeks,” he said.
Los Angeles mayor Eric Garcetti said he would identify cuts of up to $US150m ($215m) in the LAPD’s budget to invest more money into the black community, women and “people who have been left behind”.
The President, who has urged a tough approach to protests, some of which were violent in the days after Mr Floyd’s death but which were overwhelmingly calm last weekend, tweeted: “This year has seen the lowest crime numbers in our Country’s recorded history, and now the Radical Left Democrats want to Defund and Abandon our Police. Sorry, I want LAW & ORDER!”
The calls for police reform came after two weeks of protests across America provoked by Mr Floyd’s death in Minneapolis while pinned under the knee of Derek Chauvin, a white officer who has been sacked and charged with second degree murder. Bail was set at $US1.25m when he appeared in court on Tuesday. His lawyers suggested the amount would not be paid and he would remain in custody.
Greg Abbott, 62, the Republican Governor of Texas, said: “This is the most horrific tragedy I have ever personally observed but George Floyd is going to change the arc of the future of the United States. George Floyd has not died in vain.”
Democratic leaders, including Mr Biden, said they did not support the demand to defund the police. A spokesman for Mr Biden, said: “Mr Biden supports the urgent need for reform, including funding for public schools, summer programs, and mental-health and substance-abuse treatment separate from funding for policing, so that officers can focus on the job of policing.”
The Times, AP, AFP
The business leaders who have joined Team Trump
Donald Trump’s second administration is months away from taking office but the charm offensive from business leaders has already begun.
Parent killer next door: the untold story of Virginia McCullough
She murdered them and lived with the bodies for years, plundering their savings and bombarding neighbours with strange gifts – including her dead parents’ possessions.