George Floyd’s brother urges Congress to take action on police reform

WASHINGTON – In emotional testimony before a House panel Wednesday, the brother of George Floyd pleaded for members of Congress to pass police reform legislation in the wake of his brother’s death while in the custody of Minneapolis police officers.

“I couldn’t take care of George that day he was killed,” Philonise Floyd told members of the House Judiciary Committee, “but maybe by speaking with you today, I can make sure that his death will not be in vain, to make sure that he is more than another name on a T-shirt, more than another name on a list that won’t stop growing.”

It was the first hearing on policing in Congress after Democrats introduced a sweeping reform bill Monday amid nationwide protests over the killings of Floyd and other Black Americans by police. It also offered early signs of the fight that will play out in the coming weeks between two parties with starkly different visions of what needs to change.

Republicans on the committee offered their condolences to Floyd, but they maintained that his brother’s death was the result of a few bad apples and drew attention to violence against police in recent weeks. One of the witnesses called by Republicans was the sister of Patrick Underwood, a Federal Protective Service officer killed in a shooting in Oakland, California, on May 29.

“There is certainly a big difference between peaceful protests and killing police officers,” said Rep. Jim Jordan, of Ohio, the panel’s top Republican.

The GOP leader in the House, Rep. Kevin McCarthy, of California, told Floyd, “I’ll make one promise to you: Your brother will not have died in vain.”

But it’s not clear what reform measures congressional Republicans would support, nor whether President Donald Trump would sign a police reform bill. In a meeting with law enforcement leaders Monday, Trump rejected the idea of systemic problems with policing, saying that “99.9 percent” of police are “great, great people.”

But Vanita Gupta, the former head of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division under President Barack Obama, told the committee it had to do “more than tinker at the edges” of law enforcement policy.

“The outpouring of pain and anger is anything but a reaction to one isolated incident or the misconduct of a few bad apples.” Instead, she said, “the outcry is a response to the long cycle of stolen lives and violence with impunity toward black people in our nation.”

Rep. Karen Bass, a California Democrat who chairs the Congressional Black Caucus, sought to highlight common ground in her opening statement.

“Too often this debate is framed in terms of citizens versus police, us versus them,” Bass said. “But this is really about the kind of America we all want to see. We all want to be safe in our communities.”

Bass emphasized the importance of the federal reforms her party’s bill would enact, saying, “It should never be that you can do a chokehold in one city and not in another. There should be basic standards.”

Chief Art Acevedo, who heads both the Houston Police Department and the Major Cities Chiefs Association, said the national group supports the intent of the Democrats’ reform bill.

“There is no denying that changes in policing must be made,” Acevedo said. “Out of crisis comes opportunity, and this is an opportunity for all of us to have some tough conversations, to listen, to learn and to enact meaningful reform that is long overdue.”

Exactly what that reform could look like is uncertain. Mired in partisan gridlock after the 2014 killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and the protests that followed, Congress failed to pass any police reform legislation.

Some changes did come at the local level, and local and state governments are again outpacing federal lawmakers. On Monday, New York’s legislature moved to ban chokeholds statewide, and on Monday a veto-proof majority of Minneapolis City Council members pledged to dismantle the city’s police department.

At Wednesday’s committee hearing, most Democrats dismissed the idea of defunding police, a common demand of protesters that entails reallocating funds to other public safety efforts, though not necessarily eliminating police altogether. Republicans nevertheless invoked the idea repeatedly, with Jordan calling it “pure insanity,” seeking to paint Democrats as radical.

Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., asked all 12 witnesses to raise their hands if they supported defunding the police. None did, although Sherrilyn Ifill, president of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, said she took issue with the way he asked the question.

Gaetz then pointed to Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Seattle, who has expressed support for some of the work of activist groups that are pushing to cut police funding.

On Monday, Jayapal called on her city’s leaders to “completely rethink policing to create a model for public safety that truly upholds the safety of all communities and re-direct law enforcement spending and investing into essential services.”

Before it can reach Trump’s desk, any bill would need to get through the GOP-controlled Senate. Republicans in that chamber have said they are crafting their own bill, led by Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, who met with White House officials Tuesday.

Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, a member of the Senate panel charged with policing issues, said in a statement, “The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing on police use of force, and I pledge to work to find a path forward for our country.”

House Republicans from the Northwest have so far declined to detail what reforms they would support, but Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler of Vancouver said in a June 5 statement, “It’s not enough for us to put out words that aren’t connected to deeds. … I’ll be taking legislative action in the coming days.”

The weeks ahead could be a major test for the two parties’ willingness to work together in response to Philonise Floyd’s appeal to lawmakers on Wednesday.

“Stop the pain,” Floyd said, evoking the image of his brother pleading with officers to let him breathe. “George called for help and he was ignored. Please listen to the call I’m making to you now, to the calls of our family, and the calls ringing out in the streets across the world. People of all backgrounds, genders and races have come together to demand change. Honor them. Honor George.”