Defund the police

Capitol Police Show Why We Need To Defund The Police

January 13, 2021 D. A. Bullock, In These Times. Educate! Capitol, Defund the police, Police, White Supremacy

On January 6, we witnessed the vast double standard for how Black Lives Matter protest is treated versus how white-supremacy-as-mob is treated. This wasn’t just a matter of police refraining from mass beating and arresting participants in the pro-Trump storming of the Capitol: Numerous police appear to have actively supported the mob, and to have defended it after the fact. First, it’s important to clarify that what happened on January 6 was not a protest. Protest is about seeking redress for wrongdoing — this was backlash. Redress was the November 3 democratic process and recrimination of a criminal president. January 6 was payback and mob rule.

What 2,392 Incarcerated People Think About #DefundThePolice

October 28, 2020 Nicole Lewis, Anna Flagg and Aviva Shen, The Marshall Project. Educate! Criminal Justice System, Defund the police, Mass Incarceration, Prisoners

How do we fix policing in America? Can it be fixed? Donald Trump has made “law and order” a central message of his campaign, portraying anti–police brutality protesters as dangerous. Joe Biden has emphatically rejected protesters’ calls to defund the police and insists that less drastic reform can make a difference. Whoever wins the election will help shape the future of criminal justice. But while the effects of the pandemic and police violence are magnified for people behind bars, the vast majority of them will not be able to press for solutions by voting.

Minneapolis City Council’s Attempt To Defund Police Thwarted

October 18, 2020 Scott Shaffer, The Appeal. Educate! City Council, Defund the police, Minneapolis, Police violence

Last month, the New York Times ran an article by Astead Herndon about politics and police in Minneapolis. By ignoring important context and details, Herndon painted a misleading picture of what happened and what’s likely to happen in the near future. He wrote that the Minneapolis City Council’s idealistic attempt to change public safety, spurred by young and progressive activists, were thwarted by public opposition and legislative processes. In truth, most of the City Council members, who ran and won by pledging to advance racial equity, tried to do the right—and popular—thing, but were stalled by an unelected, unrepresentative commission that overstepped its authority.

At Washington Post, Defunding Police Is A Step Too Radical

August 22, 2020 Oivia Riggio, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting. Educate! Defund the police, Media, Police violence, Washington Post

Since the May 25 murder of George Floyd by the Minneapolis police, calls across the US to defund police departments—shifting resources from law enforcement to social services—have grown louder. In June, New York City Mayor Bill DeBlasio shifted $1 billion from the NYPD—at least on paper (Gothamist, 6/29/20)—and Minneapolis city council members vowed to dismantle the police department and build a new model of public safety (though the city’s charter commission kept an initiative to eliminate a requirement to maintain a minimum number of police officers off the November ballot—Washington Post, 8/5/20).

Shrinking The Footprint Of Police: Six Ideas For Enhancing Safety

August 21, 2020 Center for Court Innovation. Create! Abolish Police, Defund the police, Police, Public safety

Spurred by the brutal and senseless murder of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and other Black Americans, people are demanding that we redirect money away from police budgets into sustainable community-driven solutions. Policymakers, communities, residents, and organizations are committing themselves to finding solutions that build safety, limit the use of police, and are rooted in anti-racist practice. The Center for Court Innovation has worked with communities to build public safety for decades. Based on lessons learned, we believe that this is not the work of a moment, but rather a long-term shift in both thought and action. And it will take many different strategies to achieve change. Jurisdictions should rethink public safety—what it is and how to achieve it. Solutions should be locally-driven. Communities must no longer be subject to systemic racism and oppression, and their residents, especially Black and brown people, must have the ability to live without the undue harm of arrest, prosecution, and incarceration.

Defund The Police Movement Can Learn From Corrupt Gun Trace Task Force

August 20, 2020 Jaisal Noor, Waging Nonviolence. Strategize! Baltimore, Corruption, Defund the police, Police abuse

“I Got A Monster” is a page turner that’s as hard to put down as it is disturbing. What’s more, it could not be more relevant to our times. Through extensive reporting, authors Baynard Woods and Brandon Soderberg show that repressive police tactics — like throwing civilians into unmarked cars and fabricating and planting evidence — are more than recent national news topics. They have been used for years against Black communities. Immaculately researched, the authors use court documents, wiretaps, interviews, and body camera footage to recreate the unraveling of one of the greatest police scandals of our lifetime: the corrupt Gun Trace Task Force, or GTTF.

Minneapolis Reneging On George Floyd Promises

August 14, 2020 Glen Ford, Black Agenda Report. Create! City Government, Defund the police, Minneapolis, Police abuse

At the height of the Minneapolis rebellion, a majority of the city council announced they would move towards “disbanding” their police force, in response to Black Lives Matter “abolition” demands. It turned out that what the councilpersons were actually proposing was a name change, retaining a force of armed cops in a new “Department of Community Safety and Violence Prevention” with a “holistic, public health-oriented” mission. But even this palliative was too much for the Minneapolis Charter Commission, which voted to delay putting the police reorganization question on the November ballot, effectively killing the measure. The city is currently required to maintain a set ratio in the number of cops per resident.

‘We Are On The Cusp Of Something Great’

August 2, 2020 By In These Times. Organize! Black Lives Matter (BLM), Defund the police, Democracy, Rebellion2020

Since the nation erupted after the May 25 police killing of George Floyd, Black organizers and community members have been working around the clock to channel mass protests into tangible victories. Nikita Mitchell, 26, is national coordinator of The Rising Majority, formed in 2017 by the Movement for Black Lives, a coalition that includes Black Lives Matter. Rising Majority is led by Black people and people of color, and brings social movements together in an anti-racist, anti-capitalist Left for radical democracy.

More Federal Officers Deploying To Portland

July 27, 2020 Conrad Wilson and Jonathan Levinson, OPB. Educate! Defund the police, federal law enforcement, Police violence, Portland

Several dozen additional out-of-town federal law enforcement officers are deploying to Portland as they look to make additional arrests in the coming days, while also shifting tactics from the use of tear gas, according to multiple federal law enforcement sources. The federal response has so far sparked four civil rights lawsuits, a Department of Justice inspector general investigation, proposed legislation in Congress limiting the role of federal law enforcement in American cities, and has injured a number of protesters. Rather than quell the protests as was the intent, it’s served to reenergize and strengthen the city’s protest movement.

Ten Reasons Why Defunding Police Should Lead To Defunding War

July 21, 2020 By Medea Benjamin and Zoltán Grossman, CODEPINK. Create! Defund the police, Military Budget, Pentagon, Police violence

Since George Floyd was murdered, we have seen an increasing convergence of the “war at home” against Black and brown people with the “wars abroad” that the U.S. has waged against people in other countries. Army and National Guard troops have been deployed in U.S. cities, as militarized police treat our cities as occupied war zones. In response to this “endless war” at home, the growing and thunderous cries for defunding the police have been echoed by calls for defunding the Pentagon’s wars. Instead of seeing these as two separate but related demands, we should see them as intimately linked, since the racialized police violence on our streets and the racialized violence the U.S. has long inflicted on people around the world are mirror reflections of each other.

On Contact: Police Reform

July 19, 2020 Chris Hedges, RT. Resistance Report Defund the police, Police violence, Policing, Public safety

On the show this week, Chris Hedges talks to writer, academic and activist Philip McHarris about the latest calls for police reform in the US. McHarris says the entire system of policing has to be unearthed. He argues there is no way to tweak or reform our way out of mass incarceration or the current policing apparatus and the culture of surveillance. The broader culture of punishment and control is actively harming certain people while also failing to provide public safety. Along the way to remaking the entire system, there are certain steps that can be taken in order to begin dismantling and shifting resources and power.

Amid Calls To Defund Police, Detroit Leaders Weigh In On Alternatives

July 14, 2020 DeJanay Booth, Model D Media. Create! Defund the police, Detroit, Police violence, Restorative Justice

In the wake of Floyd’s death, protests have mobilized in several states, and locally in Detroit, where protesters have marched regularly since late May. While most protests have mostly been peaceful, there have been instances of violence, including during the early days of the protests when demonstrators were met with tear gas, shields, and handcuffs, with scores arrested after being out past curfew and reports of some protesters hurling objects at police; a police car driving through a crowd of protesters; and the fatal shooting of Hakim Littleton by police near Six Mile and San Juan. Police footage shows Littleton being shot after firing at officers who were arresting a man on a separate matter, sparking a protest that resulted in eight arrests.

The Police Defunding Con Game

July 13, 2020 Margaret Kimberly, Black Agenda Report. Strategize! Community control of police, Defund the police, Police abuse, Police violence

Cutting police budgets without establishing public control over their behavior doesn’t solve the problem, and invites politicians to shuffle budget numbers around like a three-card monte swindle. Unfortunately, a key demand of the new movement has led to confusion and to political defeats at a crucial moment. At first glance, the idea of defunding the police seems to have merit. Everyone who wants to end police brutality welcomes the idea that they might lose some of the resources they use in their terrorism spree. The police are the modern-day slave patrol and any effort to diminish their capabilities seems like a good idea. But the state doesn’t work that way.

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