Six years after George Floyd’s death, a push for federal policing reform begins anew

By Ashlee Banks
Special to the AFRO

Six years ago today, a cellphone video recorded on a Minneapolis street corner fundamentally shook the conscience of the nation.

May 25 marks the sixth anniversary of the murder of George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man whose dying breaths under the knee of a White police officer ignited a global reckoning on racial injustice and police accountability. Today, while the streets that once filled with millions of protesters are quiet, the battle over Floyd’s legacy has firmly returned to the halls of Congress.

U.S. Rep. Glenn Ivey (D-Md.-04), alongside members of the Congressional Black Caucus and Floyd’s family, is leading a renewed push to pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, a comprehensive federal reform bill that previously stalled in the face of partisan gridlock.

Ivey told the AFRO that “it’s important for us to continue to push the issue.”

“The George Floyd Act was important when it was introduced several years ago,” said the Maryland Democrat. “What’s happening with ICE is a powerful reminder of the need to have these kinds of legal protections in place.”

On May 25, 2020, Minneapolis police officers responded to a call alleging that Floyd had used a counterfeit $20 bill at a local convenience store. What followed was captured in agonizing detail by Darnella Frazier, a teenage bystander whose video footage went viral.

Officer Derek Chauvin pinned Floyd face-down on the asphalt, pressing his knee into Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes. Despite Floyd’s repeated, desperate pleas – “I can’t breathe” – and the urging of horrified onlookers, the officers did not relent. Floyd was pronounced dead later that evening. The footage dismantled the initial, sanitized police press release that described Floyd as suffering “medical distress” during an arrest. Within days, cities across the globe erupted in historic protests, demanding systemic changes to law enforcement culture.

In April 2021, Derek Chauvin was found guilty of state charges of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder, and second-degree manslaughter, later receiving a 22.5-year state sentence. He also pleaded guilty to federal civil rights violations.

Three other officers at the scene, J. Alexander Kueng, Thomas Lane, and Tou Thao, were convicted in both federal and state courts for their roles in aiding and abetting the murder.

Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison led the charge for the convictions. He told the AFRO that contrary to what some may believe, he brought Chauvin to “accountability” not “justice.”

“Justice would be true restoration of constitutional democracy,” said Ellison. “What we have is one bad actor being brought to answer for their bad behavior. Their illegal, unconstitutional behavior.”

Following Floyd’s death, a wave of local policing reforms swept the nation as dozens of states and municipalities instituted local bans on chokeholds, restricted no-knock warrants, and mandated the use of body-worn cameras. Yet, civil rights advocates have long maintained that a patchwork of local ordinances is insufficient to cure what they describe as systemic flaws in American policing.

The legislative centerpiece of the movement, the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, was designed to establish sweeping federal standards. The bill successfully passed the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives twice, once in 2020 and again in 2021. However, it repeatedly hit an immovable wall in the U.S. Senate.

Despite months of intense, bipartisan negotiations between U.S. Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and U.S. Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), lawmakers ultimately failed to reach a compromise. The factions primarily clashed over provisions to alter qualified immunity, the legal doctrine that heavily shields individual officers from civil lawsuits. For years, the federal legislative response languished, reduced to an executive order signed by President Biden in 2022 that applied primarily to federal law enforcement agencies rather than state and local departments.

With the arrival of the sixth anniversary, Rep. Ivey, a former federal prosecutor, leads the vanguard trying to revive the stalled legislation.

“We’re going to keep fighting until we get it,” Ivey told the AFRO.

The reintroduced bill aims to establish a new national framework for transparency and accountability through several key mechanisms. First, it amends the federal mens rea standard for prosecuting police misconduct, shifting the requirement from proving “willfulness” to proving “recklessness.” It also alters the strict protections of qualified immunity to ensure individuals can seek civil justice when their constitutional rights are violated.

Furthermore, the legislation creates a national police misconduct registry to track officers with histories of misconduct, preventing them from simply switching jurisdictions to avoid accountability.

Ellison told the AFRO that the legislation will “improve policing, build trust between police and community, and ultimately result in safer communities.”

“If we didn’t have bad actors on the police force like in the case of Tamir Rice and Sonya Massey … it could go a long way toward restoring order and collaboration between police and community,” said the attorney general.

On a tactical level, the act mandates nationwide bans on chokeholds, carotid holds, and no-knock warrants in federal drug cases. Finally, the bill increases data transparency by requiring state and local law enforcement agencies to report disaggregated data on use-of-force incidents, categorized by race, sex, disability and age.

As Congress gavels back into session, Ivey faces the same steep, uphill legislative climb that thwarted his predecessors. But for the advocates, lawmakers, and family members gathering to honor Floyd’s memory today, the introduction of the bill serves as a firm reminder that the mandate of May 25, 2020, remains unfulfilled.

The post  Six years after George Floyd’s death, a push for federal policing reform begins anew appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.