The government’s response to known connections of law enforcement officers to violent racist and militant groups has been strikingly insufficient.
Introduction
Racial disparities have long pervaded every step of the criminal justice process, from police stops, searches, arrests, shootings and other uses of force to charging decisions, wrongful convictions, and sentences. footnote1 As a result, many have concluded that a structural or institutional bias against people of color, shaped by long-standing racial, economic, and social inequities, infects the criminal justice system. footnote2 These systemic inequities can also instill implicit biases — unconscious prejudices that favor in-groups and stigmatize out-groups — among individual law enforcement officials, influencing their day-to-day actions while interacting with the public.
Police reforms, often imposed after incidents of racist misconduct or brutality, have focused on addressing these unconscious manifestations of bias. The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), for example, has required implicit bias training as part of consent decrees it imposes to root out discriminatory practices in law enforcement agencies. Such training measures are designed to help law enforcement officers recognize these unconscious biases in order to reduce their influence on police behavior.
These reforms, while well-intentioned, leave unaddressed an especially harmful form of bias, which remains entrenched within law enforcement: explicit racism. Explicit racism in law enforcement takes many forms, from membership or affiliation with violent white supremacist or far-right militant groups, to engaging in racially discriminatory behavior toward the public or law enforcement colleagues, to making racist remarks and sharing them on social media. While it is widely acknowledged that racist officers subsist within police departments around the country, federal, state, and local governments are doing far too little to proactively identify them, report their behavior to prosecutors who might unwittingly rely on their testimony in criminal cases, or protect the diverse communities they are sworn to serve.
Efforts to address systemic and implicit biases in law enforcement are unlikely to be effective in reducing the racial disparities in the criminal justice system as long as explicit racism in law enforcement continues to endure. There is ample evidence to demonstrate that it does.
In 2017, the FBI reported that white supremacists posed a “persistent threat of lethal violence” that has produced more fatalities than any other category of domestic terrorists since 2000. footnote3 Alarmingly, internal FBI policy documents have also warned agents assigned to domestic terrorism cases that the white supremacist and anti-government militia groups they investigate often have “active links” to law enforcement officials. footnote4
The harms that armed law enforcement officers affiliated with violent white supremacist and anti-government militia groups can inflict on American society could hardly be overstated. Yet despite the FBI’s acknowledgement of the links between law enforcement and these suspected terrorist groups, the Justice Department has no national strategy designed to identify white supremacist police officers or to protect the safety and civil rights of the communities they patrol.
Obviously, only a tiny percentage of law enforcement officials are likely to be active members of white supremacist groups. But one doesn’t need access to secretive intelligence gathered in FBI terrorism investigations to find evidence of overt and explicit racism within law enforcement. Since 2000, law enforcement officials with alleged connections to white supremacist groups or far-right militant activities have been exposed in Alabama, California, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Louisiana, Michigan, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, and elsewhere. footnote5 Research organizations have uncovered hundreds of federal, state, and local law enforcement officials participating in racist, nativist, and sexist social media activity, which demonstrates that overt bias is far too common. footnote6 These officers’ racist activities are often known within their departments, but only result in disciplinary action or termination if they trigger public scandals.
Few law enforcement agencies have policies that specifically prohibit affiliating with white supremacist groups. Instead, these officers typically face discipline, if at all, for more generally defined prohibitions against conduct detrimental to the department or for violations of anti-discrimination regulations or social media policies. Firings often lead to prolonged litigation, with dismissed officers claiming violations of their First Amendment speech and association rights. Most courts have upheld dismissals of police officers who have affiliated with racist or militant groups, following Supreme Court decisions limiting free speech rights for public employees to matters of public concern. footnote7 Courts have given law enforcement agencies even greater latitude to restrict speech and association, citing their “heightened need for order, loyalty, morale and harmony.” footnote8
Some officers who have associated with militant groups or engaged in racist behavior have not been fired, however, or have had their dismissals overturned by courts or in arbitration. Such due process is required to ensure integrity and equity in the disciplinary process and protect falsely accused police officers from unjust punishments. Certainly, there will be cases where an officer’s behavior can be corrected with remedial measures short of termination. But leaving officers tainted by racist behavior in a job with immense discretion to take a person’s life and liberty requires a detailed supervision plan to mitigate the potential threats they pose to the communities they police, implemented with sufficient transparency to restore public trust.
Progress in removing explicit racism from law enforcement has clearly been made since the civil rights era, when Ku Klux Klan–affiliated officers were far too common. But, as Georgetown University law professor Vida B. Johnson argues, “The system can never achieve its purported goal of fairness while white supremacists continue to hide within police departments.” footnote9 Trust in the police remains low among people of color, who are often victims of police violence and abuse and are disproportionately underserved as victims of crime. footnote10 The failure of law enforcement to adequately respond to racist violence and hate crimes or properly police white supremacist riots in cities across the United States over the last several years has left many Americans concerned that bias in law enforcement is pervasive. footnote11 This report examines the law enforcement response to racist behavior, white supremacy, and far-right militancy within the ranks and recommends policy solutions to inform a more effective response.
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- Discussion
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This report confirms their may be links to White supremacist groups among US law enforcement. It isn't clear on the details. https://t.co/5rTnUTpngw
— Claire Berlinski. (@ClaireBerlinski) August 28, 2020
This is a long thread, but it's right. And Claire says something I've thought but not said out loud: There could well be police forces who've been infiltrated by white supremacists who are going to up the violence intentionally. This is a time for steady nerves. https://t.co/l6NefKNcah
— Tom Nichols (@RadioFreeTom) August 29, 2020
But it's plausible to suspect some law enforcement agencies have been infiltrated by white supremacists.
If so, this is what will happen in the next 66 days:
Black men will be killed by white cops.
This will be filmed.
— Claire Berlinski. (@ClaireBerlinski) August 28, 2020
1) Nothing.
2) Realize it's a provocation, and respond intelligently.
Getting black Americans to riot, loot, and burn down buildings is *Trump's re-election strategy.* Trump, white supremacists, and Russia are counting on black people to riot in response.
— Claire Berlinski. (@ClaireBerlinski) August 28, 2020
I don’t know. Maybe it depends on where a person lives. I remember many years ago the local police department was notorious for taking suspects — mostly black ones — to a vacant lot for a beating before hauling the perp to the police station. But one of their victims prevailed in a lawsuit against the police, so now if I call to report any crime less than murder, I would be lucky if the police even show up.
I believe in many places the police are hamstrung from doing their jobs. Either their supervisors or some high ranking local politician (e.g. the mayor) are telling them to back off. After George Floyd’s death, there were some peaceful protests, but then some out-of-town anarchists arrived to hijack the protests and turn them violent. Stores were burned and looted, white people were threatened and even violently attacked. I know they were out-of-towners because some were arrested and the local news reported where they were from. I don’t care if people want to march, but I do care if they firebomb my house.
So if this article is correct, we have two extremes — overzealous police who shoot unarmed civilians or police who don’t do their jobs. Don’t know if there is rampant racism and white supremacy adherents in every police department as this article seems to claim, but I do know we have a problem everywhere with law enforcement that must be addressed.
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