Congresswoman Veronica Escobar (TX-16), member of the House Judiciary Committee, voted for the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021.
This legislation is a bold, comprehensive approach to creating safer communities by supporting good officers and holding law breakers accountable in an effort to change the culture of law enforcement, building trust between law enforcement and our communities. This legislation also helps address systemic racism and bias to help save lives across the country. The George Floyd Justice In Policing Act was first introduced during the 116th Congress and passed by a bipartisan vote of 236 to 181 on June 2020.
“Last summer, the murder of George Floyd sparked a movement. The words ‘I can’t breathe’ and the voices of millions of Americans renewed calls for justice for the countless men and women killed by police brutality,” said Congresswoman Escobar. “Today, once again, I am proud to join the Congressional Black Caucus in support of the George Floyd Justice In Policing Act – the first step in our journey towards true justice and policing reform across the country.”
The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021:
- Prohibits federal, state, and local law enforcement from racial, religious and discriminatory profiling, and mandates training on racial, religious, and discriminatory profiling for all law enforcement.
- Bans chokeholds, carotid holds and no-knock warrants at the federal level and limits the transfer of military-grade equipment to state and local law enforcement.
- Mandates the use of dashboard cameras and body cameras for federal offices and requires state and local law enforcement to use existing federal funds to ensure the use of police body cameras.
- Establishes a National Police Misconduct Registry to prevent problematic officers who are fired or leave on agency from moving to another jurisdiction without any accountability.
- Amends federal criminal statute from “willfulness” to a “recklessness” standard to successfully identify and prosecute police misconduct.
- Reforms qualified immunity so that individuals are not barred from recovering damages when police violate their constitutional rights.
- Establishes public safety innovation grants for community-based organizations to create local commissions and task forces to help communities to re-imagine and develop concrete, just and equitable public safety approaches.
- Creates law enforcement development and training programs to develop best practices and requires the creation of law enforcement accreditation standard recommendations based on President Obama’s Taskforce on 21st Century policing.
- Requires state and local law enforcement agencies to report use of force data, disaggregated by race, sex, disability, religion, age.
- Improves the use of pattern and practice investigations at the federal level by granting the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division subpoena power and creates a grant program for state attorneys general to develop authority to conduct independent investigations into problematic police departments.
- Establishes a Department of Justice task force to coordinate the investigation, prosecution, and enforcement efforts of federal, state and local governments in cases related to law enforcement misconduct.
The George Floyd Justice In Policing Act carries the support of leading civil rights and social justice groups such as the NAACP, National Action Network, Urban League and The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.
The full text of George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021 is available
here.
