Executive Session
Floor Speech
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Ms. CANTWELL. Mr. President, I come to the floor today after my colleagues have held a moment of silence for the passing of George Floyd. His family should not be preparing for his funeral today. All Americans, regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, gender, or sexual orientation, deserve to have equal protection under the law.
It is time that we not just speak out about injustice; it is time that we pass new Federal laws to protect the civil liberties of U.S. citizens and protect them from these injustices. What is our role here in the U.S. Senate? I believe it comes to passing new laws for those Federal protections.
The U.S. Attorney General is the top law enforcement of our country. He directs and supervises U.S. attorneys that prosecute Federal crimes.
The Attorney General is supposed to make sure that citizens in our country have equal protection of the law. He is supposed to uphold the Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable seizure and the Civil Rights Act, that protects against excessive use of force by police.
It is not about calling out the military. It is about protecting the civil liberties of our U.S. citizens. He is supposed to enforce 18 U.S. Code Sec 242, which prohibits the deprivation of rights under the color of law. It criminalizes abuse by police.
The U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division is supposed to step in when police departments have serious abuses. The Civil Rights Division is responsible for enforcing Federal prohibitions on patterns or practices of policing that violate the Constitution or other Federal laws.
It conducts investigations of allegations of systemic police misconduct and reaches comprehensive agreements on reforms that are needed to restore effective policing and trust with communities. If it cannot reach an agreement, the Division will bring a Federal lawsuit to compel the needed reforms.
Yes, we have something to do here in Washington.
Throughout U.S. history, the Civil Rights Division has played a major role in a number of critical cases, including the prosecution and murders of Medgar Evers and Dr. Martin Luther King.
Yes, we have something to do here in Washington.
The Obama administration made policing reform a priority. The Civil Rights Division was active in helping oversee pattern and practices of police department abuses and entered numerous consent decrees with Seattle, with New Orleans, on Ferguson, with Baltimore, and with Cleveland.
Why? Because we had cases that needed that Federal oversight. We saw that there were abuses of use of force across the country, including even in my home State, that we needed to address.
In 2006, Otto Zehm, a man with developmental disabilities, was wrongly accused of stealing money from an ATM. Mr. Zehm was improperly hog-tied by police, placed on his stomach, and he died from lack of oxygen to his brain. As he was dying, he said, ``I was just on my way to get a Snicker bar.''
It breaks my heart that somebody with disabilities was treated this way. There was a Federal indictment in this case and the police officer was found guilty of excessive use of force, lying to investigators about the confrontation. As a result of a civil case, the Spokane police were required to receive special training on interaction with mentally ill suspects and detainees.
In 2010, John T. Williams, a Native American, a seventh-generation woodcarver who used his knife to make street art, was fatally shot seven times in the back by Seattle police. He had hearing difficulties and mental health challenges. Literally, he was just carving in one spot and decided to move across the street to another spot. When he didn't respond to the officer, he was shot and killed. The officer who killed Mr. Williams wasn't charged, but the U.S. Department of Justice did investigate and found that there was a pattern and practice of abuse by Seattle police.
The U.S. Department of Justice and Seattle agreed on a consent decree, which required a number of reforms.
And now, just recently, an African American named Manuel Ellis died from respiratory arrest due to physical restraint by a Tacoma police officer. This just happened in March of 2020. Meth and an enlarged heart contributed to his death, but the Pierce County medical examiner ruled his death a homicide, and his case is under investigation.
All of these issues in the State of Washington led our citizenry to have a debate about this. In 2018, 62 percent of Washington voters approved ballot initiative 940. It required de-escalation. It required training for police officers to understand how to help and deal with the public. It mandated first aid to a victim of deadly force, and it required an outside investigation into the use of that deadly force.
It also removed the requirement that prosecutors prove malice to hold police officers criminally liable for use of deadly force. And that continues to need improvement in our state.
These were steps in the right direction, but these events in the last several weeks have showed us that it is not time to step back from this issue; it is time to pass new Federal legislation.
Under the Trump administration and Attorney General Barr, the U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division police practices group has been reduced to half. It has not opened a major pattern-or-practice investigation of police departments' violation of civil and constitutional rights. President Trump and his administration have pulled back from Department of Justice's important oversight role, at a time we can see that we need more of a Federal role, not less.
In November 2018, then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions changed the Department of Justice policy to make it even harder for the Department to perform its oversight role of our police departments. He made it harder for the Department of Justice to reach dissent decrees with State and city governments and limited the reforms that they could require.
The Trump administration has shown that it isn't interested in the community policing programs that have shown success in the past. There are numbers that statistically show that better investment in community policing helps us lower the crime rate.
In 2017, the Trump administration led the U.S. Department of Justice to significantly scale back on the Obama-era program called Collaborative Reform Initiative, which provided support to improve trust between police and communities. And under the Trump administration, it no longer strongly supports consent decrees, which have been so helpful in holding local cities and police departments accountable for civil rights abuses.
The Trump administration tried to defund the Office of Community Policing and Services Program. Thank god our colleagues have refused that. This provides important Federal funding help hire community policing and officers and to provide technical assistance.
I think this stands in stark contrast to President Obama, who requested that the COPS program be funded each year in his budget request.
But all of this brings us to where we are today. What the citizenry of the United States of America is telling us is that we need better laws on the books. I believe we need to act here. The death of George Floyd has shown us that there is a clarion call and a need for more Federal action.
I believe in these things: I believe that we should have a prohibition on chokeholds and knee restraints that cut off oxygen to the brain.
I believe that we should, just like the State of Washington, provide for more Federal support for de-escalation training.
I believe in establishing a Federal standard for the use of body cameras, and when they should be mandatory, because I think they should be, and making sure that what happens to the video is available, and that the public knows and understands what is happening.
I believe in requiring an independent investigation, just like we did under State statute--and by the way, that initiative that was voted on, with some of these provisions in them, in the State of Washington, and received 60-percent approval from the Washingtonians of our State. Why? Because they believe these things are essential. The Duckworth bill provides for a independent investigation when deadly force has been used, and we should be making this the Federal law of the land.
And we need to provide more support for community policing, and not just the dollars but accountability for when and how the dollars are used, so the community knows exactly what is going on with the Federal dollars for community policing.
And we need to require the Attorney General and Assistant Attorney General, who lead the USDOJ Civil Rights Division, to vigorously identify and end patterns and practices of abuse in police departments and seek penalties for those who haven't.
I suggest a Federal audit every year where there are practices and patterns of abuse and give us the information so that we in Congress can also help in holding those accountable for not meeting the Federal standards of upholding citizenries' civil rights.
And we need to create a clear Federal standard on the use deadly force, just like the Washington State voters did when they passed legislation. Whether we do it like the Washington voters in ending the defense on malice, or whether we look at what my colleagues Senator Booker, Harris, and Markey have suggested, let's have that debate.
I am ready to say to my side of the aisle: Let's get these issues--I mentioned seven of them--let's get them out here. I am asking my colleagues on this side of the aisle: let's engage on this Federal debate and show the citizenry of America that we hear them.
Let's not also just be deaf to the plight and fate that our officers are dealing with every day on the streets of America. We need more funding to help our police departments. We definitely, in some cases, need additional pay. But for this, we also need to deal with our housing crisis, our mental health crisis, our opioid addiction crisis. So many of our men and women in blue are policing our streets not for crimes but for dealing with the population that is living on the streets. We need to do better here than to shortchange them and to not help--not to help correct these situations that have now become day-to- day tasks in what has never been part of the law enforcement effort.
I ask my colleagues, let's put our differences aside to get real action on these. There is a Federal role on civil rights enforcement. Let's take that role seriously, let's respond to the death, and do something about it. I know that the best way to honor George Floyd today would be to help pass the laws that help protect the citizenry of our State. We are a great country, and we can do better by meeting this challenge.
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