Democrats to Propose Broad Bill to Target Police Misconduct and Racial Bias
Elements of the package, to be unveiled on Monday by House and Senate Democrats, are certain to meet with opposition from police unions and their allies.
The bill, which House and Senate Democrats have named the Justice in Policing Act of 2020, is a direct response to the recent killings of three black Americans by white civilians and officers that have prompted protests across the country, but it includes policies that civil rights activists have been pushing for decades to combat racial bias and excessive use of force by law enforcement. The New York Times obtained a copy of a section-by-section summary of its contents, circulated privately on Capitol Hill late Friday.
It would be the most aggressive intervention into policing by Congress in recent memory, and elements of it are certain to meet with staunch opposition from politically powerful police unions and other law enforcement groups that have fought against such efforts in the past. It is not clear whether President Trump, who often aligns himself with law enforcement and has advocated the use of brutal police tactics, will embrace such measures now.
As currently proposed, it would significantly change federal law and require states and localities to make modifications of their own, such as instituting mandatory bias training, to receive federal funds. It would create a national registry to track police misconduct and require that law enforcement agencies report data on the use of force, as well as ban certain chokeholds and other practices that were used in confrontations with the police that left black Americans dead.
Because most police departments are under state and local control, there are limits to the kinds of changes Congress can mandate from Washington. Calls from activists to break up or drastically restructure police departments, for instance, are more likely to be answered at the state and local level. Still, the changes Democrats are proposing would be significant.
“Persistent, unchecked bias in policing and a history of lack of accountability is wreaking havoc on the black community,” House and Senate Democrats who assembled the package wrote in an email to colleagues on Friday accompanying the summary. “Cities are literally on fire with the pain and anguish wrought by the violence visited upon black and brown bodies.”
The effort is being led by Representative Karen Bass of California, the chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus, Representative Jerrold Nadler of New York, the House Judiciary Committee chairman, and Senators Cory Booker of New Jersey and Kamala Harris of California, the only two black Democrats in the Senate. They cited the deaths of George Floyd in Minnesota and Breonna Taylor in Kentucky that have inspired protests across the country, as well as other well-known victims of such force in recent years. If adopted, the bill would rewrite key elements of the federal criminal code related to police misconduct to make it easier to prosecute law enforcement officers and for individuals who are victims of such practices to recover damages.
The federal police misconduct statute currently makes it a crime for an officer to “willfully” violate an individuals’s constitutional rights, meaning prosecutors must prove an officer acted with the intention of depriving the person of their rights. Democrats plan to propose lowering that standard of criminal intent to “knowingly or with reckless disregard.” The change is likely to face opposition from police unions and their allies.
The legislation would also alter the legal doctrine known as qualified immunity that shields police officers from being held legally liable for damages sought by citizens whose constitutional rights were violated. In addition, Democrats are proposing to change the federal standard for the use of force by officers from “reasonableness” to only when it is “necessary to prevent death or serious bodily injury.” The bill would require that federal officers use de-escalation tactics and use deadly force only as a last resort. Grants to state and local agencies would require them to do the same.
In federal drug cases, lawmakers intend to propose banning “no knock” warrants, which allow police to enter a residence without warning or identifying themselves, and incentivize states to do the same. Ms. Taylor was shot and killed in her home during such a raid.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/06/us/politics/democrats-police-misconduct-racial-bias.html