The Justice in Policing Act is a critical step towards unraveling the systemic racism embedded within law enforcement.
“We thank Speaker Pelosi, Leader Schumer, Congressional Black Caucus Chair Bass, Chairman Nadler, and Senators Booker and Harris and others for their commitment to tackling police violence.
The senseless deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade and so many others have inspired an unprecedented movement against anti-Blackness.
Our organization has marched to end Stop and Frisk, to affirm that Black Lives Matter and to demand justice and accountability in the face of anti-Blackness. We are committed to continue working alongside our partners in the racial justice movement to build support for this legislation,” said Rea Carey, executive director, National LGBTQ Task Force Action Fund.
The Justice in Policing Act seeks to enact critical changes in law enforcement by:
- Banning the use of chokeholds and other deadly tactics
- Limiting the transfer of military weaponry and equipment to police departments.
- Ban on police profiling based on race and other categories.
- Changing the legal standard to make it easier to hold police accountable for misconduct when they use deadly force
- Making lynching a federal crime.
- Helping prevent police misconduct in the first place by increasing data and transparency, as well as important modifications to training and practices.
LGBTQ People and Law Enforcement
In 2011, the National LGBTQ Task Force and National Center for Transgender Equality conducted the first ever National Transgender Discrimination Study. The report included the following data on Black trans and gender non-conforming respondents:
- Thirty-eight percent (38%) of Black transgender and gender non-conforming people who had interacted with the police reported harassment, 14% reported physical assault, and 6% reported sexual assault.
- Thirty-five percent (35%) of Black respondents had been arrested or held in a cell due to bias at some point in their lives.
- Half (51%) reported discomfort with seeking police assistance. Physical and sexual assault in jail and prison is a serious problem. Twenty-nine percent (29%) of Black respondents who had been to jail or prison reported being physically assaulted and 32% reported being sexually assaulted while in custody.
Other data points:
- According to the Anti Violence Project, in 2017, 9% of LGBTQ+ homicides were related to police violence (source).
- According to a 2015 study by the National Center for Transgender Equality, 58% of transgender people who contacted the police reported some form of mistreatment, such as harassment, misgendering, and assault (source). This number increases to 61% when looking specifically at the experience of Black transgender respondents (source).
- 57% of all respondents said they would be uncomfortable asking the police for help (source), that rate increases to 67% when looking specifically at Black respondents (source)
- National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs found in 2013 that transgender people were 3.7 times more likely to experience police violence than the general population (source).
- Transgender people of color were 6 times more likely to experience police violence in that same period (Same source).