President Donald Trump has acknowledged the nationwide protests against police brutality by proposing some “police-friendly reforms.”
President Donald Trump has acknowledged the nationwide protests against police brutality by proposing “police-friendly reforms.” According to Politico, Trump is expected to present an executive order to the White House that would create a national database of police misconduct, this way officers with a history of overly aggressive behavior can’t be transferred to another department to avoid public scrutiny.
A senior administration official told media sources that the order will also urge social workers and mental health professionals to work more closely with front-line officers. The last part of the order gives a brand new set of guidelines for deescalation training for these officers and when the best time to use force would be. According to White House Officials, the “goal of the order was not to demonize police officers.”
The order itself was crafted in close consultation with police officers, city mayors, conservative black individuals, religious leaders, and the families of some of the victims of police brutality. The main goal is to ensure that the White House, and politics in general, continue to support the police; which is essentially the opposite of what all the protests occurring around the nation are asking for.
Trump stated: “The overall goal for the executive order is the desire to maintain law and order as well as justice and safety. I think this will be very comprehensive.”
Trump’s administration knows that policing is one of the biggest political issues currently, and will have a major impact on how citizens vote in November. The biggest push-back from Democrats is Trump’s lack of acknowledgement on the murder of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and the countless other black Americans who have been killed by police officers within the past few months alone.
The main divide lies in the fact that the public is demanding for a complete overhaul of the system while Trump, his administration and other political leaders believe that these violent acts are done by “rogue” police officers who don’t actually represent what the force is all about. This order aims to simply tweak the current system while essentially making no real changes.
The executive order will not give any additional funding for new training despite de-escalation training being one of the highlights of the bill. However, a senior administration official said police departments that decide to take on the new training could receive priority for federal grants. This aspect of the order has already received major backlash for prioritizing funding for police training over the millions of citizens who are currently unemployed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
“Somebody like the murderous cop in Minneapolis against George Floyd, he had more than a dozen complaints against him. The union is protecting him, he’s eligible for a pension. It’s all kinds of things that can be done so we can ensure people are doing their job,” said Kellyanne Conway.
White House senior advisers Jared Kushner, Ja’Ron Smith, chief of staff Mark Meadows, and the director of the Domestic Policy Council Brooke Rollins spent the last week developing this order alongside Republican Senator Tim Scott.
The other main goal of this order was to hopefully gain the support of Democratic Congress members and citizens. Two individuals working closely on the creation of the order told Politico that they left any major details for police reform to future legislation.
“We are looking forward to tomorrow and for the president to have the opportunity to have a discussion where he has both police officers and police officer representatives in the room with families of people who were killed by police officers to have the discussion that the country needs to have so that we can turn the anger in this country right now into action,” said a senior administration official.
After the initial press conference on Tuesday individuals took to social media to detest the order, claiming that de-escalation training and a database that can be tampered with is nowhere close to the reform the protests have been demanding. All the families of the victims that were involved in creating the order were apparently invited to attend the press conference, however, none showed up.
Protests are continuing every single day in all of the major US cities. Luckily, police involvement in these protests has dialed back, so a majority of them have been able to remain peaceful. However, after body cam footage was released from the murder of Rayshard Brooks last week, the public has become even more angry at the administrations lack of acknowledgement at this clear systemic issue. Now, as November approaches more and more voters are gearing up to make their voices known and heard, as many are tired of demanding change and seeing no results.
Eric Mastrota is a Contributing Editor at The National Digest based in New York. A graduate of SUNY New Paltz, he reports on world news, culture, and lifestyle. You can reach him at eric.mastrota@thenationaldigest.com.
