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Louisiana police officer Raymond Mott (left) was fired after this photo of him surfaced doing a Nazi salute with a KKK member during an anti-immigration rally. |
One of the ominous aspects of the racial awareness brought about in the aftermath of George Floyd's death is the apparent friendliness between the police and counter-protestors who show up at Black Lives Matter demonstrations.
In 2015, a classified FBI Counterterrorism Policy Guide, obtained by The Intercept, stated that “domestic terrorism investigations focused on militia extremists, white supremacist extremists, and sovereign citizen extremists often have identified active links to law enforcement officers.”
Unfortunately, those good men and women are having their profession sullied by a few bad officers who abuse the power given to them by the public.
The recent incidents that have occurred since the anti-racist demonstrations began occurring every day since Floyd's death but earlier studies have warned about the infiltration of police departments by white supremacists and the recruitment of current police officers by the same radical white organizations.
As early as 2006, an FBI assessment, “White Supremacist Infiltration of Law Enforcement,” warned of white supremacist plans of “infiltrating law enforcement communities or recruiting law enforcement personnel.” The report said that skinhead groups were encouraging members to become “ghost skins” within law enforcement agencies, a term the report said white supremacists use to describe members who “avoid overt displays of their beliefs to blend into society and covertly advance white supremacist causes.”
One of the cases cited in this report about an 18-year-old Chinese student in Nashville, Indiana, who was attacked by a white supremacist with a hatchet.
“Federal law enforcement agencies in general — the FBI, the Marshals, the ATF — are aware that extremists have infiltrated state and local law enforcement agencies and that there are people in law enforcement agencies that may be sympathetic to these groups,” said principle researcher Daryl Johnson told The Intercept.
“Many people in these communities of color feel they have been the subject of police violence for decades,” said Samuel Jones, professor of law at the John Marshall School of Law in Chicago. “And when an officer engages in conduct that adds or enhances that divide," says Jones, "they are ultimately jeopardizing the integrity of their agencies and putting their fellow officers in danger.”
In 2015, a classified FBI Counterterrorism Policy Guide, obtained by The Intercept, stated that “domestic terrorism investigations focused on militia extremists, white supremacist extremists, and sovereign citizen extremists often have identified active links to law enforcement officers.”
Not all police officers are racists! Let me repeat: Not all police officers are racists.
Despite the lofty words of law enforcement leaders promising to institute reforms and weed ou the bad cops, the rank-and-file Blue Line just doesn't get why the reforms are necessary.
Despite the lofty words of law enforcement leaders promising to institute reforms and weed ou the bad cops, the rank-and-file Blue Line just doesn't get why the reforms are necessary.
Just before police teams tear-gassed and forced demonstrators away from the White House just prior to Donald Trump's photo op at St. John's Episocopal Church, white police officers warned armed white counter-protesters to go inside because of the pending police action.
- During protests in New York City, a New that has been linked to white supremacist groups, basically the thumb and forefinger forming an "O" and the other three fingers extended.
- The Albuquerque police department in communicating with each other on their walkie-talkies referred to one militia group at another protest as “heavily armed friendlies,” according to KUNM radio station.
- Around 100 young, white men wandered around Philadelphia wielding baseball bats, tire irons and golf clubs, unchallenged by the white police officers. They were allegedly protecting their neighborhoods. They "beat the shit" out of one bystander recording them. Witnesses said officers "high-fived" some of the vigilantes.
- In Minneapolis where George Floyd was killed, the leader of the police union of the Minneapolis Police Department, Lt. Bob Kroll, was a defendant in a discrimination lawsuit brought by four black police officers against the MPD. In their complaint, the plaintiffs allege that the Lieutenant openly wore a “White Power badge” on his a motorcycle jacket.
Unfortunately, those good men and women are having their profession sullied by a few bad officers who abuse the power given to them by the public.
The recent incidents that have occurred since the anti-racist demonstrations began occurring every day since Floyd's death but earlier studies have warned about the infiltration of police departments by white supremacists and the recruitment of current police officers by the same radical white organizations.
As early as 2006, an FBI assessment, “White Supremacist Infiltration of Law Enforcement,” warned of white supremacist plans of “infiltrating law enforcement communities or recruiting law enforcement personnel.” The report said that skinhead groups were encouraging members to become “ghost skins” within law enforcement agencies, a term the report said white supremacists use to describe members who “avoid overt displays of their beliefs to blend into society and covertly advance white supremacist causes.”
One of the cases cited in this report about an 18-year-old Chinese student in Nashville, Indiana, who was attacked by a white supremacist with a hatchet.
In 2009 report by the Department of Homeland Security looked into right-wing extremism and its relationship to “violent radicalization” in the United States.
“Federal law enforcement agencies in general — the FBI, the Marshals, the ATF — are aware that extremists have infiltrated state and local law enforcement agencies and that there are people in law enforcement agencies that may be sympathetic to these groups,” said principle researcher Daryl Johnson told The Intercept.
The reports were so strongly denounced by Republicans that nothing came of them during the Obama administration. Obama's DOJ did enter into consent decrees with over a dozen police departments needing reform. However, Donald Trump's first Attorney General Jeff Sessions stopped enforcing the decrees and no new consent decrees have been signed by Trump's DOJ.
Despite these reports' warnings, there have been an alarming number of reports of officers exposing racist beliefs and tendencies from -- Facebook photos of an officer giving a Nazi salute or wearing a Klan hood to discovery of actual membership in hate groups such as the KKK, the League of the South or the Oathkeepers.
When discovered, these racist officers are usually fired, but the good intentions of higher-ups don't do anything to prevent the rise in white supremacists infiltrating law enforcement or falling prey to racist ideology.
Police departments must do more to root out the bad officers and they need to employ more sophisticated personality and bias tests to discover the racist beliefs held by the men and women trying to enter law enforcement.
What makes the matter worse, it appears that the police officers have adopted the "no snitch" rule when fellow officers commit unlawful acts or use excessive force against a suspect. If law enforcement hopes to regain the trust of the people they are supposed to serve, the majority of police officers need to speak out when they see one of their peers doing something wrong.
Although the First Amendment’s freedoms of association and expression mean it’s perfectly legal for anyone to join a hate group and still be a member of law enforcement, modern screening tests can uncover aggressive behavior, flawed decision-making and racial biases that might affect the way they perform their duties thus should disqualify police recruits' eligibility. According to the FBI memo, the government can limit employment opportunities of members “when their memberships would interfere with their duties.”
Although the First Amendment’s freedoms of association and expression mean it’s perfectly legal for anyone to join a hate group and still be a member of law enforcement, modern screening tests can uncover aggressive behavior, flawed decision-making and racial biases that might affect the way they perform their duties thus should disqualify police recruits' eligibility. According to the FBI memo, the government can limit employment opportunities of members “when their memberships would interfere with their duties.”
“Many people in these communities of color feel they have been the subject of police violence for decades,” said Samuel Jones, professor of law at the John Marshall School of Law in Chicago. “And when an officer engages in conduct that adds or enhances that divide," says Jones, "they are ultimately jeopardizing the integrity of their agencies and putting their fellow officers in danger.”
Now that George Floyd's killing by a police officer allowed people to see what Blacks have been saying for years -- the unequal justice meted out to their community.
Pete Simi, a sociologist who spent decades studying the proliferation of white supremacists in the U.S. military, agreed. “The report underscores the problem of even discussing this issue. It underscores how difficult this issue is to get any traction on, because a lot of people don’t want to discuss this, let alone actually do something about it.”
It took Floyd's death to get a serious police reform bill introduced in Congress. The House of Representatives voted June 25 to pass H.R. 7120, the "George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2020."
The bill languishes unheard in the Mitch McConnell-controlled Senate.
EDITOR'S NOTE: A word of caution, this is news sprinkled with opinion. Readers are encouraged to seek multiple news sources to formulate their own positions.
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