Skip to main content

tv   Washington Journal Laurie Robinson  CSPAN  April 28, 2021 5:37pm-6:01pm EDT

5:37 pm
and norms. democrats thought it was unreasonable to require 60 votes to confirm president obama's nominees, yet you have groups like demand justice out there telling democrats to #resist every one of president trump's judicial nominees. so it is political games we are hearing about. and how you depoliticize the federal judiciary is let judges do their job. you don't threaten to pack the judiciary, you don't threaten to impeach them like justice kavanaugh, you don't threaten term limits, you let judges do their job. pedro: mike davis of the article three project, thanks for your time. clarence j robinson is the former co-chair on the white
5:38 pm
house task force on 20th-century policing. thanks for joining us. on the topic of policing reforms, you had a piece in politico that looks at the form efforts post trial. the headline says, the terrain going forward will not be the same. can you tell us why ? guest: it is helpful to step back and think about the terrain before this as well. if we look back to michael brown's death in ferguson in 2014, and the death of eric garner, tamir rice, and others in the aftermath of that, the geary institute of justice did a study and found that 34 states and the district of columbia passed 79 laws on police reform in the two years after ferguson.
5:39 pm
so there was a flurry of activity at that time to pass laws on things like body cameras, training for police, crisis intervention team training on handling individuals with mental health problems, so there has been forward movement of some kind in recent years. but in the aftermath of george floyd's tragic death last summer, there has been movement forward. the national conference of state legislatures as said 30 states have passed 140 laws, or a little more, in the policing area just since last may. but i said that the terrain has
5:40 pm
shifted now because, despite all the attention that has been focused on this area by states and also local governments in changing laws, the attention to the verdict last week of not only our country, but the international global community, has really been fixed on why policing is still broken, and what more can be done to fix it. and i think that attention will continue to be mobilized around what steps can be taken top move forward in this area. pedro: in the last line of the piece, you talked about this idea of what is broken in law enforcement. what are the top elements, or what is broken as you see it? laurie: what i also said is the
5:41 pm
importance of leaders within policing to carry the banner forward on this, because i think there are strong leaders in policing, particularly on the management side, but police unions are also important to help in building corrective action here. and the two areas where we need change, perhaps three, but substance is really -- but substantively, on use of force and police accountability, two buckets, two areas. and the broader area i guess one would say is police culture, the way things are done and we need to recognize that changing
5:42 pm
institutions is not an overnight task, and that work will proceed over a period of time. we also need to recognize that policing is very decentralized in the united states,, unlike many of our european colleague countries. in great britain, there are something like 35 policing departments. here, we have 18,000 state and local policing agencies and they are not federally controlled. they are all controlled, as we know, at the local level, by mayors, county commissioners, locally-elected sheriffs, and that means that you don't, for example, order change from the top. i was surprised when i cochaired
5:43 pm
the white house task force president obama appointed, how many people, including some members of the washington press, asked me after our report was concluded whether president obama was going to order police chiefs in the united states to implement some of those recommendations. the president of the united states doesn't have the authority to order any police chief at the local level to do much of anything, because of our federal system, as you would know, pedro. so our decentralized system means institutional change in policing is a longer process. pedro: our guest is laurie robinson of george mason university. you also heard her talk about her work at the white house when it comes to this issue. if you want to ask her about police reform efforts, (202)
5:44 pm
748-8000 for the mountain and eastern time zones, (202) 748-8001, through the central time zones. you can text us your thoughts at (202) 748-8003. we saw an announcement from merrick garland yesterday, talking about investigations by the justice department on this front. one announced last week, one this week. i want to play you a little bit about the why they are doing that to get your response. >> we are uniquely aware of the challenges faced by those who serve as police officers. we see their commitment firsthand every day, and we recognize the complex issues that make their already-difficult jobs harder. the justice department is also charged with ensuring that the
5:45 pm
constitutional and federal statutory rights of all people are protected. as i explained last week, congress has authorized the department to conduct pattern or practice investigations to help fulfill that responsibility. those investigations at the recommendations and actions that ensue to not only protect individuals' civil rights, they also assist police departments in developing measures to increase transparency and accountability. pedro: so those investigations, the minneapolis and louisville police departments, what do think about the justice department role? and can you talk more about these practice investigations he spoke of? laurie: i have worked very closely with law enforcement over my career. i was with the justice department for 10 years as assistant attorney general, and i worked with state and local law enforcement across the country, and with the international association of
5:46 pm
chiefs of police. i agree with attorney general garland that law enforcement, particularly on the front lines, have extraordinarily challenging jobs that call for very difficult decisions, frequently made in difficult terrain and on split-second required decision-making. at the same time, the justice department as important role. i think attorney general garland is making a correct decision in reinstituting the pattern or practice lawsuits or investigations, i should say, in this case, that he has done in the minneapolis case, and hearing the announcement this week in louisville, kentucky.
5:47 pm
these investigations and lawsuits were authorized by the 1994 violent crime control act, the so-called crime bill. and i think they represent a measured response by the federal government to as your, as -- to ensure, as he announced yesterday, that constitutional rights are protected and that police departments are not interfering in inappropriate ways with those rights of individuals. pedro: when those investigations are completed, what happens then? our corrective measures needed that are -- our corrective measures needed? laurie: yes, in some cases,
5:48 pm
federal judges oversee a monitoring agreement in which a police department agrees to a set of measures that are changes in how it operates. and under those agreements, there is a kind of tracking of whether the department continues to implement those measures. so when cities like baltimore and seattle, as examples of those measures, those are now underway. pedro: our guest is jim from cairo, missouri on the democrats' line. you are on with lori robinson. go ahead. laurie: good morning. i would say the fault is that police are not supposed to kill people. defend yourselves. defend somebody else, the same as any other citizen carrying a gun.
5:49 pm
if i make a mistake and i shoot somebody with a phone at their head, i will go to jail. treat the police the same as everybody else, legislating use of force, they talk about training as if it was written in the bible. if the training results in bad results, change the training. i lived in south for a long time, and the people end the traffic and the tension in me, i was ready to go postal. i moved to a rural area, my aggression tapered off, disappeared. i cannot imagine a policeman in the same environment that i lived through not developing a
5:50 pm
bad attitude. they never get to move to the country like me. they do it every day, every day. pedro: jim, thank you. we will let our guest respond. miss robinson. laurie: you rightly point out that training is important and stressed is really there for police officers to deal with. i will say that there are different situations that are very limited, in which police officers do need, unfortunately, to use lethal force. if there is a hostage situation and a hostage is about debbie killed, and there are offenders with guns and somebody has a chance to rescue that hostage,
5:51 pm
we can think of situations where violent drug gangs or whatever it might be, that in that rare situation, there may be a need for lethal force. that is why it is authorized by law for police officers to use. the problem is, those events should be extraordinarily rare. pedro: gary in orlando, florida. you are next. hello. laurie robinson my name is gary -- caller: my name is gary robinson. -- my name is gary. i grew up in new york city. my father worked for new york city transit. i assumed the police were good, but in 1977, december 3, i went to church, came home, with my
5:52 pm
brother, 14, myself, 16, to the local store and i turned to my brother and said be careful, it is slippery, it has been sleeping all morning. as i opened the door, a police officer reached out, about six feet four inches tall, picked me up and threw me into a metal container, a big dumpster. it split my head open. as i laid on the floor, i kept asking, why would you do that, why would you do that? he kept looking down at me and said, you people always cause problems. and i kept repeating, who are you talking about? who are these people? i don't know what you are talking about. he kept yelling, you people are always causing problems. my 14-year-old brother leaned over to help me and said, do you mean people like my family who pay your salary? he took out his nightstick, jabbed my 14-year-old brother in the ribs and shoved him on top of me. we help each other home, got into the house, helped each
5:53 pm
other up the stairs, barricaded ourselves in the room and my mother was outside crying, what happened, what happened? because she saw a trail of blood up the stairs. pedro: in the interest of time, we appreciate the story, but what would you like our guest to address from that? mr. robinson: -- caller: it is not the training. the training is right. the training is working the way it is supposed to work. we are t -- we are targets. i've been stopped 11 times working through maia -- walking through my own area. i am asked for a green card i don't have. pedro: thank you, gary. ms. robinson? caller: racial profiling and
5:54 pm
police brutality of any kind cannot be accepted. this goes to my comment about police culture. it has got to change. it cannot be accepted. it obviously is not true, i would say, for the vast majority of our law enforcement officers in this country, who are dedicated, honest, and not embracing of those actions. but it sadly is certainly true of some, as our caller reported. and while the actions he reported took place many years ago, sadly, they still occur today. and it is those types of occurrences that far too many people in this country have also experienced that have sadly given law enforcement a bad
5:55 pm
reputation. one of the things that does encourage me is that so many of the leaders in law enforcement are committed to changing this, and we need support from within law enforcement to make this change. and i think that support is there. we need to join hands to make this happen. pedro: a story in "the washington post" this morning talks about efforts in albuquerque by federal authorities, with a civilian federal oversight agency as a solution, but the police union later sued and demanded the resignation of an agency board member regarding the police use of force policy. what role does the union play? mr. robinson: i thought that that story, which i did read,
5:56 pm
was very revealing and very discouraging. research by the council on criminal justice, which is an important new criminal justice think tank, has shown -- this recently came out -- that civilian review boards and civilian oversight groups have frequently not been effective, because they have not been given sufficient power, subpoena power and oversight tools, audit ability, ability to go in for internal records, to play a meaningful role in oversight. that was a critical piece of that article.
5:57 pm
and that has made them vulnerable to the kind of attacks and bullying, i would say, that that article described about police unions. police unions, sadly, have been obstacles to change that is needed in law enforcement. now, that is not true of every leader and individual involved in police union work. but overall, police unions have served as a barrier to needed change, unfortunately. pedro: tom is next from paris, california -- perris, california, with our guest, laurie robinson of george mason university.
5:58 pm
mr. robinson: i am a -- caller: i am a two-time felon and anytime i get pulled over, they already know who you are. at any time, they think you're going to run from them, you are going to get that reaction. so when they cry and get shot and stuff, just hand it over. you all are what he there -- you are already there, just give it up, you are already in custody. you are not going to win. that is george floyd, just give it up, you are not going to win. at things happen when people don't comply. pedro: miss robinson? mr. robinson: i would like to think that a properly operating law enforcement would not be a bullying law enforcement. so i don't know that i would
5:59 pm
agree that that is the way it should operate. but it may be the reality in many jurisdictions. pedro: when it comes to qualified immunity, laurie robinson, i want to play lindsey graham, republican from south carolina, talking about what qualified immunity doesn't what he would like to see. i will play his perspective and then get yours. >> number one, we would have had police reform in the last congress but chuck schumer and kamala harris block ringing up, scot's reform bill. they filibustered the -- filibustered because they didn't want him scott and president trump to get credit. we will try again. qualified immunity is a big deal. >> the u.s. house is about to gavel in for a brief pro forma session. this is part of c-span's commitment to bring you live, gavel-to-gavel coverage of
6:00 pm
congress. we head to the floor of the u.s. house on c-span. [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, i nc., in cooperation with the united states house of representatives. any use of the closed-captioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u.s. house of representatives.] the speaker: the house will be in order. the prayer will be offered by our chaplain, chaplain kibben. chaplain kibben: would you pray with me? almighty god, we pause to approach you, keenly aware that our business this evening is not to be the usual political discourse. rather tonight we seek some sense of awareness of where we are and look for direction as to where we should go as a nation in these tumultuous times.

44 Views

info Stream Only

Uploaded by TV Archive on