MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
The Justice Department says it wants to withdraw an oversight agreement with the Minneapolis Police Department. City leaders and the DOJ signed the federal consent decree just before President Biden left office. But the Trump Justice Department says there's no basis for the agreement. Minnesota Public Radio reporter Matt Sepic is here in the studio with me to tell us more about this. Good morning, Matt.
MATT SEPIC, BYLINE: Good morning, Michel.
MARTIN: So the consent decree followed the murder of George Floyd, as we know, who was Black. He was killed by a white police officer five years ago. Tell us more about how this consent decree came about.
SEPIC: Just after a Minnesota jury convicted former police officer Derek Chauvin of Floyd's murder in 2021, then-U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland opened a civil rights investigation into Minneapolis police. Two years later, the DOJ found that officers routinely used excessive force against Black and Native American people and discriminated against people with behavioral health issues.
In early January of this year, the city and the Biden DOJ signed a proposed consent decree that would mandate changes. Among other things, it bans chokeholds and neck restraints. The chief must OK any use of tear gas for crowd control. And officers must speak up anytime they see a colleague violating someone's rights, no matter the ranks of the officers. It's important to note, Michel, that the police department initiated many of these changes soon after Floyd's murder.
MARTIN: What did the Trump officials say about why they wanted to back out of this proposed consent decree or why they intend to back out of this decree?
SEPIC: The Justice Department under President Trump says the Minneapolis agreement and a similar one in Louisville, Kentucky, quote, "would have imposed years of micromanagement of local police departments by federal courts and expensive independent monitors." In a statement, Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon says consent decrees are overly broad and hand control of policing, quote, "over to unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats, often with an anti-police agenda."
MARTIN: And what are Minneapolis leaders saying about this Justice Department move?
SEPIC: Well, Mayor Jacob Frey says the city will abide by the agreement, regardless of what the DOJ does.
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JACOB FREY: Neither Trump nor anyone in Washington can stop us from doing this work that we are indeed committed to. We know what needs to happen, and indeed we've already started.
MARTIN: Now, Matt, I want to mention that Minneapolis police already have a similar agreement in place with the state of Minnesota. Does DOJ's decision change that in any way?
SEPIC: No, it doesn't. A court-ordered settlement agreement between police and the Minnesota Department of Human Rights has been in place for just over a year, and it includes many of the same provisions that are in the federal proposal. Minnesota's human rights commissioner says the state-level agreement, quote, "isn't going anywhere."
MARTIN: And you talked to some local police reform activists. What did they tell you?
SEPIC: Well, they're, of course, not happy with the DOJ's decision. Civil rights attorney Nekima Levy Armstrong says the conditions at MPD that led to George Floyd's murder still remain five years later, and this is a deliberate attempt to roll back progress.
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NEKIMA LEVY ARMSTRONG: As far as I'm concerned, that federal consent decree is written in blood, the blood of those who have been brutally murdered at the hands of the Minneapolis Police Department.
SEPIC: The Minneapolis group Communities United Against Police Brutality, which has advocated for a consent decree for years, is urging a federal judge to reject the DOJ's request and implement the consent decree anyway. And the ACLU says it's filing public records requests in Minneapolis, Louisville, and other cities where the Biden Justice Department found patterns of law enforcement misconduct.
MARTIN: That is Minnesota Public Radio reporter Matt Sepic. Matt, thank you.
SEPIC: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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