Despite broad popular support for legislation to curtail police violence, Congress got nothing done. Democrats, despite controlling both the House and Senate in 2021 and 2022, slow-walked the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, insisting on bipartisan support that never materialized. Ending qualified immunity, the legal standard that prevents police officers from being sued for wrongdoing even when they knowingly break the law, was deemed not urgent by Jim Clyburn, then the highest-ranking Black member of the Democratic House majority, despite that being a core demand of the protest movement. Once that slipped away, it opened the door to even smaller reforms floating out of reach.
In the end, despite the embarrassing photo op in which Democratic leaders donned matching kente-cloth stoles and knelt on the floor of the Capitol building, no reforms were passed into law. After much hand-wringing over activists’ use of the slogan “Defund the Police,” no major efforts to defund large police departments were ever implemented. Police killings continued to increase: Officers killed at least 1,232 people in 2023, the deadliest year in a decade.
Now not even a single representative who swept into Congress on the heels of the popular mandate of police reform remains.
It’s a stark outcome. Consider, for example, Georgia Rep. John Lewis, an activist during the Civil Rights Movement and the leader of the 1965 march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge, in Selma, Alabama. Lewis continued his activist work for years afterward, arriving in Congress only in the 1980s, but he served 17 terms as a celebrated member of the Democratic House caucus until his death in 2020.
Worth noting, this opinion piece came out before Ilhan Omar’s primary took place, which she ended up winning
e; wrong archive link
While MeToo and BLM were fairly short-lived political movements, they had an incredibly large and positive impact on the culture.
I remember a time just before covid when saying “black lives matter” was a controversial phrase. Now, not being able to say it is fairly scandalous. But for gay marriage, I can’t think of many things which were as widely accepted as the fight for racial equality (in slogan, at least).
I’m not excited for the pendulum to swing back, led by corporate america, joy.
they had an incredibly large and positive impact on the culture.
I wish this was true, but I’ve only seen our financial commitment to police violence increase over time.
Ending qualified immunity, the legal standard that prevents police officers from being sued for wrongdoing even when they knowingly break the law, was deemed not urgent by Jim Clyburn, then the highest-ranking Black member of the Democratic House majority, despite that being a core demand of the protest movement.
I’ll go to my grave believing the reason Bernie wasn’t the candidate in 2020 is because of coordinated primary dropouts and Clyburn’s endorsement of Biden.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Clyburn#Presidential_endorsements
You can bet Bernie would have made police reform happen.
Clyburn’s endorsement of Joe Biden on February 26, 2020, three days before the South Carolina primary, was considered pivotal in the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries. Several analyses have determined the endorsement changed the trajectory of the race, due to Clyburn’s influence over the state’s African-Americans, who make up the majority of its Democratic electorate. Until Clyburn’s endorsement, Biden had not won a single primary and had placed fourth, fifth, and a distant second in the Iowa, New Hampshire, and Nevada caucuses and primaries, respectively. Three days after the South Carolina primary, Biden took a delegate lead on Super Tuesday, and a month later he clinched the nomination.[84][85][86] Biden went on to win the 2020 Presidential election. Clyburn’s endorsement of Biden, and subsequent political endorsements in later democratic primaries, have given him a reputation as a political “kingmaker”.
Having said all that, it seems a little shitty that they wrote this piece before the primary.
You can bet Bernie would have made police reform happen.
He would have tried. But there’s a real and persistent fear that corporate money would have turned on him during the general election and sunk his campaign.
Consider that Biden only squeaked by with 40,000 votes across three states, even in a media environment that was heavily favorable.
I can see Sanders going out to Trump like Corbyn did in the UK, and for the same reasons.
I see your point, but also still feel the primaries were intentionally manipulated. (twice)
I absolutely agree.
I just don’t think the manipulation would have ended at the convention.
Fair point, but I don’t know when we’re going to get a shot at someone like Bernie in office again. AOC is an up and comer, but the right has already vilified her Clinton-style since she took office, so I’m slightly worried that’s not in the cards for her. I guess I’m just lamenting that, even while realizing that even as president they can only do so much.
I don’t know when we’re going to get a shot at someone like Bernie in office again
If we keep losing quality candidates like Cori Bush and Jamal Bowman to money bombed hacks, I don’t know if we’ll see another Sanders in my lifetime.
I guess I’m just lamenting that, even while realizing that even as president they can only do so much.
Presidents don’t just fall out of the coconut tree. They’re a consequence of their material conditions and everything that came before them.
We have a very short attention span in the usa
It wasn’t that Americans forgot…
It’s that Israel spent millions of dollars to keep them out of office. Mostly because they kept mentioning Israel is activating committing a genocide, but considering their practice of giving Black Israeli immigrants birth control for years while telling them it was vaccines…
They likely weren’t a fan of BLM either.
The short attention span part is when Harris and Walz have both given speeches at the annual AIPAC conferences but people are pretending they’re perfect because they’re not 20 years past retirement age.
I’m still hoping they’ll do the right thing while in office, and they’ll undoubtedly be better than Biden or trump…
But they’re miles away from perfect. And pretending they are won’t help anything, it just means they only get pressure to move to the right.
Good. The whole “defund the police” movement was just stupid. Crime will ALWAYS be an issue in a country like the US, where there’s millions of people with different types of background, cultures, and beliefs. No other country on the planet has this same type of society. We need tough law enforcement, and we need to be able to enforce those laws. Go to any ghetto or run down neighborhood in America and ask them if they want “less cops” on the streets…
Go to any ghetto or run down neighborhood in America and ask them if they want “less cops” on the streets…
Oh boy, THAT is a can of worms. Poor/minority neighborhoods are DOUBLE victims. I realize this is counter intuitive, but they end up simultaneously under-policed AND over-policed.
“How the hell does that work?” you ask… WELL…
tl;dr - Redidents of high crime neighborhoods can’t rely on the police when they call for help (under policing) while at the same time, are continually hassled by cops for doing nothing (over policing).
So if you can’t trust the cops to show up when you need them, and are continually hassled by them when you don’t need them, how would that make you feel about police funding?
Have you ever actually LIVED an a bad area in an inner city? I have, in Southern California and Central California. The neighborhoods are victims to drugs, gangs, and violence. The only thing stopping an all out war happening in these areas is law enforcement. I’d rather risk the chance of “being harassed” by cops, over being killed by gang violence any day.
