- Following another week of
state and nationwide protests
over the death of George
Floyd, U.S.
Congresswoman Gwen Moore of
Milwaukee is calling to
build a ground up approach
to dismantle structural racism.
Also, the Congressional Black
Caucus, of which she is a
member, this week rolled out a
package of legislation to
address policing.
U.S. Representative Gwen Moore
joined us earlier this week
and representive, thank you so
much for being with us.
- Wonderful always to be with
you Frederica.
- We haven't spoken to you in
the wake of George Floyd's
death.
After police have inflicted
deadly force on other black men
over so many years, including
in your district in Milwaukee,
why this
time do you think his death
sparked worldwide protest?
- You know, Frederica, that
question really deserves
a lot of pondering and
historians will tell us why.
But, you know,
the reality is that the entire
world was an
eyewitness
to this lynching.
And it was a, it was a
strangulation, very
inhumane, very
reminiscent of
the legacy
of slavery.
And even those folks
who doubted that there were--
that there was discrimination
and that that police
were particularly violent
to the African-American
community could no longer deny
it. I think that that it
really made
a huge difference for people to
to to have to bear witness
to such a horrific act.
- You say that you are proud
that as lawmakers you
are directing your outrage
into legislative action,
specifically provisions of
the Justice and Policing
Act of 2020 include
banning chokeholds, tracking
police misconduct, making
it easier to sue police
officers and making lynching
a federal crime.
And yet you call this just
a starting point.
How so?
- Well Frederica, I just want
to point out that members of
the Congressional Black Caucus
have been working on this
legislation
for years prior
to the untimely and unfortunate
death of George Floyd.
One of those provisions, the
de-escalation training, really
was inspired
by the death of
Dontre Hamilton in my own
community, where someone
who was asleep on
a public park bench
ended up being shot 14
times by a police officer.
And so
that-- I can
remember as far back as
Ernest Lacy, almost 40
years ago, him
dying by strangulation
in this town and participating
in those marches as well.
And this, of course, is a very
inhumane
way to to try
to subdue any
prisoner.
And I think these are
commonsense things
that we think are a start
because we don't think that
they are draconian
measures. Now, there are, there
is a measure
to look at qualified immunity.
And I think that that will be
the hardest piece to get over
the finish line.
But we do need to look at
a provision in
the police contract and
within our Supreme Court
rulings that basically
say a police officer
can kill you and not
have to stand
for for for
any sort of accountability
for that.
And so we want to change
qualified immunity as well.
- In regard to that,
would you favor weakening the
role of police unions,
for example, particularly their
role of protecting
and defending officers'
behavior?
- Well, you know, I'm an ardent
defender of unions.
I think unions are very
important in terms of
bargaining for wages and
benefits.
But I think it's outside of
the scope of a union
to be able to
negotiate
a lack of accountability,
to be able to negotiate
those kinds of things away.
I think that it's gone that
that that's a bridge too far.
And so, yes, I support
union rights
at large.
But I do think that
that the lack of
accountability, the lack of
trust.
We're never going to be able to
build good police community
relations, community-oriented
policing unless we have
some accountability.
You know, the piece that I've
put into this legislation,
de-escalation, is something
that everybody agrees with,
but de-escalation
will not work.
You can't train
out of, out of a person
the propensity
to kill
to, to -- if that is, in
fact, written into a contract,
that they're not going to be
accountable.
And so I think that we have to
get rid of that provision
in union contract.
- Very, very briefly,
what will it take for George
Floyd's death not to be in
vain?
It will take capturing this
moment not only
legislatively
to deal with criminal
justice reforms, but I
also think that this is an
opportunity to look at
structural racism,
period.
I mean, the dearth of housing
opportunities, the dearth of
housing of of economic
opportunities, the the
the dearth of educational
opportunities.
I think that here is a moment
where everyone in the United
States, 60, 70
% of people in the United
States and globally
have just had a
a an "aha"
moment about
how racism affects
black people in America.
And George Floyd's death
is just the end of the story.
It's not the beginning of the
discrimination.
- Representative Gwen Moore,
thanks very much for joining
us.
- Thank you Frederica.