Posted by: jgomori Posted date: January 8, 2021

On Jan. 7, NAPO released a statement from President Mick McHale regarding the criticism being laid against U.S. Capitol Police over their response to the violent mob of rioters that breached the U.S. Capitol. Part of that statement reads: “The great harm here is that officers are sometimes placed in a situation where, having been stripped of legitimate less-forceful means of maintaining and restoring order, they find themselves approaching a situation where they are forced to choose between no force at all and deadly force, because the intermediate use-of-force tools have been restricted or prohibited.”; Democrats Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff won in the run-off election on Jan. 5 to represent Georgia in the Senate, giving Democrats control of the Senate, the House and the Presidency. The Senate is now split 50-50 with Vice President-elect Kamala Harris the tie-breaking vote. Senator Charles Schumer, the current Minority Leader, will become the Majority Leader, and he has indicated he will not shy away from putting more partisan bills on the floor for a vote. With Democrats holding a very narrow majority in the House and an even narrower majority Senate, our ability to protect qualified immunity for officers, safeguard officer due process, and stop continuing efforts to “defund the police” will be an uphill battle; President-Elect Biden announced he is nominating Merrick Garland to be Attorney General. Garland is currently serving as a judge on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals and is considered a relatively moderate pick for Biden. Biden is also nominating Lisa Monaco as Deputy Attorney General. Ms. Monaco previously served as President Obama’s homeland security adviser. Under this DOJ leadership team, we can expect a very active Civil Rights Division, much like it was under the Obama Administration, greater scrutiny of state and local law enforcement, and changes in priorities for funding for state and local law enforcement assistance programs to reward grants to those agencies that have implemented or are implementing certain police reform policies; NAPO highlights their priority legislation signed into law over the past two years and measures that have been passed by House or Senate as well as court cases which ended in victory for NAPO in this report; The Department of Health and Human Services’ Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) released a report on mental health resources to support the law enforcement community, the mental health community, and state and local leaders, as required by President Trump’s Executive Order on Safe Policing for Safe Communities.

For the complete Jan. 8, 2021 Washington Report, please click on the link below.

 Jan. 8, 2021 Washington Report