Hey folks, as the country continues to react to the police, killing of George Floyd there are many legal and policy questions to grapple with last weekend, attorney general teeth. Ellison brought a new charge. Second degree: murder against Eric Children, officer opened his knee and George Floyd's neck for nearly nine minutes. Meanwhile, the protests sparked by the flight killing was an urgent conversation. Around police reform where many voices calling for quote defending the police, but all this and more with an melodrama Cathay insider Podcast, each weekly breakdown politically charged league she was making the headlines They were sharing a clip from this week's episode. You can listen to our full conversation and access all other key, the insider content with a free to a trial of the membership. You can cancel at any time had to capital Calm, slash insider to join, that's cafe, dot, com, slash insider and college students.

the valid edi you email can get a special rate of Cathy dot com, slash student. There is a new slogan that has got a lot of attention that some people are using equally in Minneapolis, and that is defined the police. It's kind of controversial a lot of reasons I got in discussion with my when my daughter other night about the phrase and she says in other people say well the people who are saying defend the police there saying not. You know, abolish the police department, not get rid of all police, not Togo, take away all their funding but they're, talking about a clear eyed reexamination of where the money goes diverting something's to other social programmes, making sure that the funding of police departments is line with what, in a reality, is an online with what proportionality is in everything else, but that's not the slogan. So we can get into what the policies on what reforms maybe are necessary. But should we spent a momentum

about the utility of that slogan and by the way, none other than the now sharpen himself said on tv. The other day by day the slogan made, this may mean may be misleading without interpretation, ITALY, the miners that a slogan is supposed to speak for itself and if in, if it requires you to do a lot of googling and read a bunch of articles to understand what is really meant. Aside from the plain language of defined the police, then I think you have a problem. You and I both worked in the Senate Worked in the Senate and when some senator stood up, and so we need to define the acts we need to define the planet. Parenthood ringing defined some other institution that men zeroing it out Thank you. So this is one of the challenges which is that I've I've now read a tonne on this, and I've talked to people about it and your daughter, her arguing is the argument that I think a lot of people are making which, as we just mean, let's change. The way we budget, the police and the one thing that we have.

power, we we ve tried all these ways to reform police departments and they failed. We try and use of all policies, we tried training and it has worked to eliminate racism and biased and the police departments so lets the one piece of power that we hold is a power. The purse strings, the city council, the residents of it of a community. We pay for the police, Let's control, that, an and by the way it is a re framing. If we want to talk about our political experience, it is a re framing of the issue. away from the reforms in the past, which were all put on top of the existing ways that police departments right so meaning. Ok, let's change the training, but let's keep basically the pipe, in the foundation of the police department, the same right. So we're not really during the infrastructure were changing some of the things that the department does. How do we do discipline? are we do training, and this is an argument of like let's grab the reins and let's wholesale revisit, what are the police do and what are we paying for it? Should we be paying for police departments that are actually a threat to black lives,

the United States, and so there is an argument in that framing that I think, is really powerful. To basically say stop talking about training even a lot of people that I really respect when when this first happen, they came out tat that training and about you know, use of force policies, and I think that those are really important is simply not enough to eradicate racism advice from police departments. So, There's a really powerful argument around the framing the problem on the defined the police. Issue, in my view, is that it is being pushed not just by people who are making the argument, which I think is a powerful one of let's take the purse strings. That's actually pay the police to do the things that police need to do and lets take everything else out if there is a call for somebody who needs help with addiction. Let's end a councillor, if there's a homeless, individualist rootlet send somebody who does a social or who does almost services. That makes a lot of sense, which is in a when you send a gun and badge and an even then forming the way that the gun and bad works, but understanding that we can support

a lot of the police powers and, frankly de escalate, a lot of the ways in which police are interacting with communities. That's one argument: the other argument is abolished the police altogether and that slogan has been around for a long time. It's now morphed into this version of defined the police, but there are people saying defined the police who say no more police departments, let's go with the violence interruption model which, by the way, is often used in addition to the police at you. In addition to the police in Chicago in New York City, and that's where you train and higher local community member, some will be formally incarcerated and they go out and they say to the people who they think will be the next shooter. Hey, don't shoot years. Why? We don't think you should shoot. There is research and shows their effective, but only in a context that I've ever seen of being in addition to law enforcement and

That's where I think the debate becomes a lot more problematic. In my view, I mean you know, you know we did a huge amount of work to remain the Police Department Camden. Ultimately, because of budget cuts, the city just couldn't sustain public safety gains, crime is going up and they became they disbanded. The police department became a county why police Force rebate the police department, from the ground up in a pretty radical way. They have, I would argue, the most progressive use of forest policy in the country. They have severely who now go out when their car accidents and set a police officers there very much devoted to community policing? So they rebuilt and new police department and they disbanded the old one? But they didn't get rid of this idea that you need someone in a community that can for the rule of law. And, frankly I think you know- I don't know how you feel about this, but the idea of having zero police in a community, particularly community, a community where there could be violence. I wear a lot about people in states where there are lawful word gun laws. Allow people to care.

that you can have people taking the law into their own hands, and so that version deepen the police is not the right way to think about it. But I do think that there is an argument around re framing that is very powerful and that is going to change the ultimate outcomes in communities because robbing a different conversation than we ever have. My big quarrel is with the slogan. I think it's really problematic and lots and lots of people and include people. The black large matter, movement understand this problematic there. It also happens to be- and I hate to be so political about, there's an election that needs to be one and is providing fodder too bad faith. People like the present his supporters to say something- that's not true, and if it happens to be the case that the reforms being suggested as you just recited at some length or reasonable and fair and proportional, that's terrific.

I don't know why you shoot yourself in the foot with a slogan that can be so easily misunderstood and so easily turned against you there's lots of things we could take away from the police to Bremen. I agree that we ask too much of police officers and police forces all the time that you know which functions could be properly done, by someone else or some other entity, and sometimes there are things that we want the police to do that they don't have no funding to do. For example, you I don't know the police departments have enough investigatory resources or alcohol case, or yet your data figure out how to solve the crime, as opposed to figure out how you can use the massive displays of force and have me you're, a great weapons. If you wanna take away funding from those things and put them into things, actually make people safer

I am all for that. I think we should all you know. Every police department should do a self audit and figure out what money it needs. What money doesn't need. The promised politically are I'm perfectly prepare eminent expert and unprovoked perfectly prepared to believe that police departments have bloated budgets in the same way that people have been arguing for a long time that the military has a bloated budget and comes at a cost to other kinds of things. It does very politically popular to throw money at the police of politically popular no money at the military. It doesn't necessarily make a lot of sense, but I am but I worry, there's also a big similarity between the police and the military, which is at the civilians who oversee them. You know in most cities, its mare or a city council have no experience in those spaces like the present United States oversees the military is now experiencing in Algeria and so

There's a huge value and not, but it also does mean that when it comes time for budgets, when a police chief says to the mayor, I need acts that money often is granted, and so I think some of this conversation is is about that. But let me say two things, because I think your points are well taken. The first is that I will tell you honestly my first reaction to define the police is its viscerally to push back against it because it sounds like the idea is for abolishing public safety and we're abolishing the rule of law and part of the problem with it is that there are these two very different visions of what it means, one of which I think would be terrible for society and for communities. The other which I think is not defending the police. More saying it over. The residents of community want control over how we do public safety and we want the police to do the things that are truly within their real house, and we want others to do the things that the police don't need to do and by the way we want the police to be accountable and have good use. A fourth policies, and all that that to me is, is a very

interesting conversation about reform that I think, is really smart and thoughtful and worth having the others, not So I agree on the visceral reaction. I also have an incredible this reaction to and I had to think a lot about about it before I came to the position of actually also believing that you know in some ways its use is being used to read. right now. I guess one of the challenges ahead of you and I were thinking about like slogans, and how do you name things like it doesn't sound quite as catchy to say, reallocate half of the police summit. Police budget to other social service agencies need it, so I think maybe there's there's a appoint their. I do Say one other thing no about why, and I actually I dont know

the conversation around to finding it's going to sound strange, but I'm much more comfortable with the conversation around disbanding a police department and radically remaking a police department right building its wording from the ground up like we did in Camden and here's. Why? When you talk about bloated budgets- and you talk about that, they should be scrutinized. Most people would not disagree. The reality of union contracts and police union contracts is that there is not a lot of wiggle room around those. So overtime is track actually pay is set contractually and what police departments are is generally full time, employees there very heavy on personnel. You know, essentially your talk bout. The number of officers you have often when you are debating police budgets, there's some small amount for technology there. Some small amount, often for analyse and cars, and things like that there needs to Be-

visiting of that goes. There needs to be more money for analyse and this type of technologies and data collection that can help you actually be much smarter and how you combat crime, but right now, there's one of the issues and one of the this sort of appeals of reforming police departments and Billina from the ground is that those union contracts go away and by the way I know come from a family of teachers and police officers and members of unions, and I believe very strongly that you do unions are critical part of american society, but I also think we have to be honest about one of the reasons that we haven't seen. A lot of reform. Police departments often relates to these things like contract.

push back from unions. And so you know this is a national conversation about it like in Camden. It's also were saying they formed a new union. They just were able to get out from under historically very, very difficult and costly police contracts that really put huge limitations on the ability of the department to bring institutional reforms, and so I prefer the conversation about reforming and re imagining policing overdue funding. Policing. But again, I understand you know the anger from the protests and the rage is basically it comes from this view of like we pay for your salaries, and you know what we get is not is not acceptable. Lookin becomes from seen after seen after seem, though we ve been sitting on television and on our phones of really inexplicable and inexcusable

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