President Trump signed an executive order on policing principles in the Rose Garden of the White House on Tuesday.Credit…Doug Mills/The New York Times
President Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday to encourage changes in policing, including new restrictions on chokeholds. But the order will have little immediate impact, and does not address calls from activists and protesters nationwide for broader action and a new focus on racism.
Speaking in the White House Rose Garden and flanked by several uniformed police officials, Mr. Trump depicted police misconduct as rare and police officers as embattled American heroes who must be defended.
The order does not mandate any immediate action; rather, it lays out what a senior administration official called “guiding principles,” to be translated into specifics by the Justice Department and Congress. Mr. Trump said he was “encouraging police departments nationwide to adopt the highest professional standards to serve their communities.”
Mr. Trump said the Justice Department will “prioritize” federal grants to police departments that follow “the highest training standards regarding the use of force.” He said that will include banning chokeholds except when a police officer’s life is in danger.
Mr. Trump said the administration is also “looking at” new non-lethal weapons. And he said police departments will need to share information about abuse complaints filed against officers who might move from department to department without the records accompanying them.
He added that the federal government would “provide more resources” for other kinds of professionals, like social workers, to accompany police officers on calls involving matters like mental health, substance abuse and homelessness.
Mr. Trump said that he met privately just before the event with the families of nine black men and women whose deaths have stoked protests. They included relatives of Ahmaud Arbery, who was killed near Brunswick, Ga., in February, as well as those of Botham Jean, Antwon Rose, Jemel Roberson, Atatiana Jefferson, Michael Dean, Darius Tarver, Cameron Lamb and Everett Palmer Jr.
Mr. Trump said he would “fight for justice for all of our people,” but he said nothing in his remarks about police racism, and scoffed at calls for major systemic changes to policing.
“I strongly oppose the radical and dangerous efforts to defund, dismantle and dissolve our police departments,” Mr. Trump said, adding, “Americans want law and order, they demand law and order.”
The New York Times
