WEBVTT - Police Reform and Post-Pandemic NYC 0:00:02.400 --> 0:00:05.520 This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the 0:00:05.640 --> 0:00:11.080 Thing from my Heart Radio. Today we're exploring issues here 0:00:11.080 --> 0:00:14.960 in New York that connect to larger ones around the country. 0:00:15.640 --> 0:00:19.759 Our guests are Michael Cecitski from the New York Civil 0:00:19.840 --> 0:00:24.120 Liberties Union and Catherine Wilde. I spoke with Kathy Wilde 0:00:24.120 --> 0:00:28.360 back in May when things looked dismal for New York City. 0:00:28.840 --> 0:00:32.479 As the President and CEO of the Partnership for New 0:00:32.560 --> 0:00:35.080 York City, Kathy is one of the smartest and most 0:00:35.159 --> 0:00:39.440 connected people I know. She's in close contact with the 0:00:39.479 --> 0:00:43.199 city's top CEO s, and now a year later, I 0:00:43.280 --> 0:00:45.280 wanted to check in with her to get a sense 0:00:45.640 --> 0:00:49.680 of what she's hearing, but first a closer look at 0:00:49.720 --> 0:00:53.920 another issue closely related to New York City's finances and 0:00:53.960 --> 0:00:59.240 city safety, police reform. Michael Cecitski is a lawyer at 0:00:59.240 --> 0:01:02.800 the New York Civil Liberties Union. One of the nyc 0:01:03.200 --> 0:01:07.160 l us top priorities is to ensure a more equitable 0:01:07.200 --> 0:01:12.280 justice system by addressing systemic police violence, and Michael leads 0:01:12.319 --> 0:01:17.400 its Police Transparency and Accountability campaign. The n y c 0:01:17.840 --> 0:01:21.039 l U is in the process of requesting police discipline 0:01:21.080 --> 0:01:25.240 records from around the state, requests made possible by the 0:01:25.319 --> 0:01:29.399 state legislatures. Recently, peal of New York Civil Rights Law 0:01:29.480 --> 0:01:34.240 Section fifty A, which previously kept the disciplinary records of 0:01:34.280 --> 0:01:39.680 police officers hidden. Was this provision of the New York 0:01:39.680 --> 0:01:43.680 State Civil Rights Law that put New York at the 0:01:43.720 --> 0:01:46.920 back of the pack when it comes to transparency on 0:01:47.240 --> 0:01:51.720 police misconduct. So this was a law that said that 0:01:52.120 --> 0:01:56.360 records of police misconduct, whether their complaints against officers, whether 0:01:56.360 --> 0:02:00.560 they're investigated, whether there's any kind of accountability, essentially a 0:02:00.600 --> 0:02:03.640 state secret um and the public was not able to 0:02:03.680 --> 0:02:05.960 know whether or not the systems that we have in 0:02:06.040 --> 0:02:09.519 place to hold officers to account for that misconduct or 0:02:09.560 --> 0:02:13.079 working because we just couldn't access any of those records. 0:02:13.639 --> 0:02:16.640 So it first came about in the nineteen seventies. Why 0:02:16.880 --> 0:02:19.799 why do you think so? The idea was that defense 0:02:19.840 --> 0:02:23.320 attorneys were doing their jobs, so police officers were upset 0:02:23.400 --> 0:02:26.200 at the fact that they were being called to testify 0:02:26.320 --> 0:02:30.960 in cases, and defense attorneys would look at whether there 0:02:31.000 --> 0:02:34.760 was a record of misconduct and that officer's history, had 0:02:34.800 --> 0:02:38.440 they made bad arrests in similar cases before? Were they 0:02:38.480 --> 0:02:42.120 ever accused of lying on the stand or on official reports, 0:02:42.160 --> 0:02:45.400 and they would use those bad acts to question the 0:02:45.400 --> 0:02:50.680 credibility of the officer testifying. Exactly. So, when fifty eight 0:02:50.919 --> 0:02:54.160 was first passed, it was justified in that lens of 0:02:54.200 --> 0:02:58.320 trying to prevent defense attorneys from going on fishing expeditions 0:02:58.680 --> 0:03:01.079 in the course of doing their jobs and representing their clients. 0:03:01.560 --> 0:03:05.520 But over time it morphed into something completely different, and 0:03:05.560 --> 0:03:08.959 it became the go to excuse that police departments would 0:03:09.000 --> 0:03:15.639 point to to withhold any kind of record of officer misdeeds. Now, 0:03:15.960 --> 0:03:19.760 was there a person or an institution or both that 0:03:19.880 --> 0:03:22.640 we're spearheading this back in the seventies, Was there somebody 0:03:22.760 --> 0:03:27.200 ramming this down the legislature's throat. It was police unions, 0:03:27.280 --> 0:03:30.519 police departments that were leaving the charge on this, and 0:03:30.600 --> 0:03:33.720 it was with a very receptive legislature. There was not 0:03:33.919 --> 0:03:38.320 a lot of organized opposition to this proposal when it 0:03:38.360 --> 0:03:41.440 came about, and maybe in part that's because it was 0:03:41.720 --> 0:03:45.800 envisioned as this narrower approach to dealing with the specific 0:03:45.840 --> 0:03:50.080 case of officers on the witness stand. But it was 0:03:50.280 --> 0:03:53.280 at a time where New York and other states were 0:03:53.280 --> 0:03:56.480 starting to pass freedom of information laws. Freedom of Information 0:03:56.520 --> 0:03:59.800 Acts to make more public records open and accessible, and 0:03:59.840 --> 0:04:01.680 the was one of the first areas where we saw 0:04:01.920 --> 0:04:04.760 police union start to push back on that trend of 0:04:04.840 --> 0:04:09.240 making more government records available to the public. Where is 0:04:09.280 --> 0:04:11.240 fifty A at now in New York? I mean it 0:04:11.320 --> 0:04:14.560 was repealed, was repealed and then something happened or did 0:04:14.600 --> 0:04:17.280 they did they litigate that? Or what? Fifty A journey? 0:04:17.360 --> 0:04:20.760 It's a long and tortured one. Fifty A started to 0:04:20.800 --> 0:04:24.320 get applied more and more outside the courtroom context and 0:04:24.520 --> 0:04:27.800 as the blanket response to public records requests going into 0:04:27.839 --> 0:04:30.680 the NYPD and other police departments, and we saw a 0:04:30.760 --> 0:04:35.920 dramatic expansion of its use in the past five ten years, 0:04:36.279 --> 0:04:41.440 largely under the Blasio administration, where the NYPD started to 0:04:42.040 --> 0:04:47.240 withhold just summary redacted information on disciplinary outcomes for officers. 0:04:47.640 --> 0:04:50.480 They used it to justify with holding data like use 0:04:50.520 --> 0:04:53.440 of for statistics and more and more. They were fighting 0:04:53.480 --> 0:04:56.800 these efforts in the courts to expand the scope of 0:04:56.839 --> 0:04:59.440 fifty A make it impossible to get any kind of 0:04:59.560 --> 0:05:02.880 access to those records. They wanted to just broaden the 0:05:02.960 --> 0:05:05.920 scope of fifty as much as they could exactly. They 0:05:05.960 --> 0:05:09.240 wanted to make the supply and context that were entirely 0:05:09.680 --> 0:05:13.040 unheard of when this law was first enacted in the seventies. 0:05:13.440 --> 0:05:16.960 So the case that ultimately led to its most dramatic 0:05:16.960 --> 0:05:20.920 expansion back in the n y c l U submitted 0:05:21.000 --> 0:05:24.560 to foil request with the NYPD. We asked for decisions 0:05:24.560 --> 0:05:26.159 from the n y p d S trial room that 0:05:26.240 --> 0:05:30.039 were redacted, didn't have officer names, are identifying information. We 0:05:30.120 --> 0:05:33.680 just wanted to see what the reasoning was of NYPD 0:05:33.680 --> 0:05:38.520 trial judges in reaching their recommendations on whether or not 0:05:38.680 --> 0:05:42.120 to hold an officer accountable, recommend discipline against them, and 0:05:42.120 --> 0:05:46.240 basically just understand what the process was. The NYPD said, no, 0:05:46.520 --> 0:05:48.960 we're not going to give you these records because even 0:05:49.000 --> 0:05:51.719 if we take officer names off of it, fifty A 0:05:52.200 --> 0:05:55.720 prevents us from telling you any of this information. And 0:05:55.800 --> 0:05:59.159 so if I'm not mistaken, what was originally wanting to 0:05:59.200 --> 0:06:03.520 redact with the names of officers specifically who might do 0:06:04.040 --> 0:06:10.600 fear retribution or their records might fairly or unfairly derail prosecution. 0:06:11.000 --> 0:06:13.200 Then it became they expanded it too. We don't want 0:06:13.200 --> 0:06:15.640 you to know anything, not just the names. We don't 0:06:15.640 --> 0:06:19.600 want you to know anything, right, exactly as it was written, 0:06:19.680 --> 0:06:23.800 applied specifically to personnel records used to evaluate performance, and 0:06:23.839 --> 0:06:26.719 what they tried to do was take a very expansive 0:06:26.800 --> 0:06:30.520 read of what counts as a personnel record. And because 0:06:30.560 --> 0:06:32.680 of the way that the statute was written, they also 0:06:32.800 --> 0:06:34.880 argue that there was no kind of out for them 0:06:34.920 --> 0:06:37.039 to just take an officer name off the file and 0:06:37.080 --> 0:06:40.720 release the underlying record or just basic summary information on 0:06:40.760 --> 0:06:44.400 the cases. They took the position that no disclosure was permitted, 0:06:44.800 --> 0:06:47.360 and that's ultimately what the State Court of Appeals held 0:06:47.640 --> 0:06:51.680 in in our lawsuit. They said that fifty A, unlike 0:06:51.960 --> 0:06:54.440 all of the other kind of exemptions that typically apply 0:06:54.480 --> 0:06:59.120 in public records laws, actually blocks police departments from releasing 0:06:59.440 --> 0:07:04.480 anything that's related to an officer's disciplinary or misconduct records, 0:07:04.839 --> 0:07:09.160 and basically punted to the legislature to take action and said, 0:07:09.160 --> 0:07:12.240 if you want this problem fixed, the legislature needs to 0:07:12.400 --> 0:07:15.360 fix it. Once fifty A was repealed and the remains 0:07:15.400 --> 0:07:19.679 repealed correct, Oh, there's lots of litigation. There was federal litigation. 0:07:19.760 --> 0:07:21.640 The Second Circuit Court of Appeals just a couple of 0:07:21.640 --> 0:07:25.120 weeks ago tossed out of police union lawsuit from New 0:07:25.160 --> 0:07:28.280 York city trying to block the publication of disciplinary records 0:07:28.640 --> 0:07:31.960 were they published. So the city had planned to publish 0:07:32.000 --> 0:07:35.520 those records until this litigation stopped them from doing so. 0:07:35.960 --> 0:07:38.720 But before the litigation even began, the NYC l you 0:07:38.800 --> 0:07:43.360 obtained a database of disciplinary records from the Civilian Compoint 0:07:43.360 --> 0:07:46.040 Review Board, this independent entity in New York City that 0:07:46.080 --> 0:07:49.360 investigates certain allegations of police misconduct. And we posted the 0:07:49.440 --> 0:07:52.280 database that we received from that agency on our website, 0:07:52.520 --> 0:07:54.840 so you can look up the three hundred thousand plus 0:07:54.920 --> 0:07:57.840 complains dating back to the nineteen eighties that are in 0:07:57.880 --> 0:08:01.080 those records. But you know, that's only a slice of 0:08:01.120 --> 0:08:04.200 the records that exist, because that is just the ccrb 0:08:04.320 --> 0:08:08.000 S files. We haven't seen the records from the NYPD 0:08:08.120 --> 0:08:11.760 itself yet, but with this ruling from the Court of Appeals, 0:08:12.120 --> 0:08:14.760 we now expect that hopefully within the next couple of weeks, 0:08:14.800 --> 0:08:17.200 we'll be able to see that information go up online. 0:08:17.640 --> 0:08:19.560 You have faith that you're going to be getting unedited 0:08:19.560 --> 0:08:23.640 on redacted information. I'm assuming when they sense that the 0:08:23.680 --> 0:08:25.560 fifty is going to be repealed that they try to 0:08:25.600 --> 0:08:28.000 do all kinds of things to prepare for that, to 0:08:28.120 --> 0:08:31.720 maintain the lack of transparency. What's happening in New York 0:08:31.920 --> 0:08:35.360 the NYPD following the repeal of fifty A, they said 0:08:35.360 --> 0:08:37.200 that they were going to create this database, they were 0:08:37.200 --> 0:08:39.600 going to put the records up online. I don't have 0:08:39.679 --> 0:08:42.000 confidence that it is going to be the full universe 0:08:42.040 --> 0:08:43.720 of records, and I do think that they're going to 0:08:43.720 --> 0:08:48.400 be selective about trying to find whatever existing exceptions in 0:08:48.800 --> 0:08:51.440 the state free of information law. They're going to find 0:08:51.480 --> 0:08:54.480 as much ground for themselves as they can to withhold 0:08:54.520 --> 0:08:57.719 certain categories of records. But we're not just relying on 0:08:57.840 --> 0:09:00.920 the department itself to make the records of llable. One 0:09:00.920 --> 0:09:03.280 of the things that the ny c LU has done 0:09:03.280 --> 0:09:06.400 in recent months is send a series of public records 0:09:06.440 --> 0:09:10.080 request to police departments across the state, demanding that in 0:09:10.160 --> 0:09:13.840 accordance with state law. Now these are public records, we 0:09:14.360 --> 0:09:17.640 demand access to them, and the departments that are not 0:09:17.760 --> 0:09:20.040 producing them. You know, we have a ton of law 0:09:20.080 --> 0:09:22.560 firms that we're working in partnership with us on to 0:09:22.640 --> 0:09:24.360 make sure that we have the ability to go into 0:09:24.400 --> 0:09:27.320 court and make sure that now that you know fifty 0:09:27.360 --> 0:09:30.760 as gone, we have a legal right to see these records. 0:09:30.800 --> 0:09:33.079 What troubles me there is that Let's say there's a 0:09:33.120 --> 0:09:35.720 piece of evidence like a tape or a photograph or whatever, 0:09:35.800 --> 0:09:37.920 that the police themselves are the only ones with a 0:09:37.960 --> 0:09:41.440 copy of that evidence. So what if the police turn 0:09:41.480 --> 0:09:44.640 around and go, no, we're not going to release it 0:09:44.880 --> 0:09:47.640 like like make us and there's no other copy of 0:09:47.679 --> 0:09:50.000 its somewhere else that another entity could release. Does that 0:09:50.040 --> 0:09:52.240 trouble you that they might just say, fuck you, We're 0:09:52.280 --> 0:09:54.840 not going to release that. It's absolutely concerning. I think 0:09:55.000 --> 0:09:57.200 what we have going for us as a starting point 0:09:57.400 --> 0:09:59.920 is the fact that with fifty A gone, the rest 0:10:00.200 --> 0:10:02.920 of the kind of framework for getting access to these 0:10:02.960 --> 0:10:06.040 types of records, the law is very much on our side. 0:10:06.080 --> 0:10:08.160 So if we have those disputes to end up going 0:10:08.200 --> 0:10:10.480 to court, if the police department is saying we don't 0:10:10.480 --> 0:10:13.240 want to turn over these records, we have really solid 0:10:13.320 --> 0:10:15.559 legal footing to go in and argue for why those 0:10:15.559 --> 0:10:17.960 records should be made available. But to the broader point, 0:10:18.040 --> 0:10:20.520 I do think it needs to be part of a 0:10:20.520 --> 0:10:25.200 broader conversation around how we're structuring police accountability systems to 0:10:25.240 --> 0:10:29.320 be more independent of the department itself. So we're looking 0:10:29.400 --> 0:10:33.080 at what it could take to have entire agencies that 0:10:33.120 --> 0:10:36.520 are set up with real disciplinary power that are not 0:10:36.720 --> 0:10:40.040 beholden to a police department structure that would exist in 0:10:40.080 --> 0:10:43.040 an agency like a civilian review board, that would exist 0:10:43.040 --> 0:10:46.040 somewhere else, so that we're mitigating the risk of putting 0:10:46.080 --> 0:10:49.160 all of this information being kept in the hands of 0:10:49.160 --> 0:10:51.800 people who have a real clear interest in not making 0:10:51.800 --> 0:10:54.920 that information public. And that's true of disciplinary records. It's 0:10:54.920 --> 0:10:57.280 one of our concerns with things like body camera footage, 0:10:57.520 --> 0:11:00.600 like if you want to have officers wearing body cameras 0:11:00.600 --> 0:11:04.160 and recording interactions to improve transparency, then you should have 0:11:04.200 --> 0:11:06.559 someone who's not the police department be the one who 0:11:06.600 --> 0:11:09.920 decides on when those records are being published and released. 0:11:10.240 --> 0:11:13.320 It's as true for disciplinary records as it is for 0:11:13.400 --> 0:11:15.880 body cameras and any other kind of tool meant to 0:11:15.920 --> 0:11:19.240 improve transparency. You can't rely on the police themselves to 0:11:19.280 --> 0:11:23.040 be transparent when they've been fighting against those basic measures 0:11:23.080 --> 0:11:25.040 for as long as they have. Who are the people 0:11:25.040 --> 0:11:28.280 in the legislature that helped bring about the repeal off 0:11:29.120 --> 0:11:31.760 on the legislative side who took the lead on this 0:11:32.000 --> 0:11:35.480 were members of the state, Black, Puerto Rican, Hispanic and 0:11:35.520 --> 0:11:38.760 Asian Legislative Caucus, the b p h A. These are 0:11:38.920 --> 0:11:42.400 legislators of color who have been really at the forefront 0:11:42.600 --> 0:11:47.559 of criminal justice reform, police reform, and really helped make 0:11:47.559 --> 0:11:51.760 sure that this legislation moved through the legislative process in 0:11:51.800 --> 0:11:54.000 as strong reform as it did. But I would say 0:11:54.040 --> 0:11:57.199 the real heroes of this movement, the people who ensured 0:11:57.400 --> 0:12:00.680 that this repeal moved forward. We're are a lot of 0:12:00.679 --> 0:12:03.599 the families of people who had lost loved ones to 0:12:03.679 --> 0:12:07.360 police violence. The mother of Eric Garner, the mother of 0:12:07.640 --> 0:12:11.439 Marley Graham. These were some of the champions who from 0:12:11.480 --> 0:12:14.800 their own personal experiences, had been fighting for years to 0:12:14.880 --> 0:12:19.400 get some basic measure of transparency and accountability from police departments, 0:12:19.480 --> 0:12:22.080 and always saw fifty A as one of the main 0:12:22.120 --> 0:12:26.240 obstacles being used to not even give them any measure 0:12:26.400 --> 0:12:29.840 of closure knowing whether or not the police department had 0:12:29.880 --> 0:12:33.360 thoroughly investigated these cases. And they led the charge on 0:12:33.400 --> 0:12:36.160 this issue and on so many of the other issues 0:12:36.240 --> 0:12:38.559 that the state legislature ended up passing last year in 0:12:38.559 --> 0:12:41.160 the wake of the George Floyd protests. What about Cuoma 0:12:41.280 --> 0:12:45.319 was he in favor of repealing so he hadn't taken 0:12:45.400 --> 0:12:47.440 much of a position on it until we saw the 0:12:47.679 --> 0:12:51.280 George Floyd protests really pick up momentum, and we saw 0:12:51.360 --> 0:12:55.680 the instances of really horrific police violence directed against protesters. 0:12:56.160 --> 0:12:58.800 But as as those protests were unfolding, we heard a 0:12:58.800 --> 0:13:02.360 call from the Governor's office to say, the legislature needs 0:13:02.400 --> 0:13:06.439 to pass something. They need to fix the statute. And 0:13:06.480 --> 0:13:09.959 you know, in that maybe week two weeks of kind 0:13:09.960 --> 0:13:13.960 of frantic negotiations putting together a police reform package, this 0:13:14.120 --> 0:13:20.240 became the centerpiece of it. Michael Sisitski is a lawyer 0:13:20.640 --> 0:13:23.960 at the New York Civil Liberties Union. If you like 0:13:24.200 --> 0:13:28.560 conversations with people who are exploring ways to save America's 0:13:28.600 --> 0:13:31.600 great cities, they would go to our archives and listen 0:13:31.640 --> 0:13:35.240 to my conversation with Tom Wright from New York City's 0:13:35.320 --> 0:13:40.160 Regional Plan Association. Right joined Corey Johnson and the Code 0:13:40.280 --> 0:13:44.200 Alimas pre Pandemic to talk about ways to cut unnecessary 0:13:44.280 --> 0:13:49.079 costs related to the subway. The entire system is broken 0:13:49.559 --> 0:13:53.120 from front to end. The procurement process in New York 0:13:53.200 --> 0:13:56.520 State is so ridiculous that contractors will be hired to 0:13:56.640 --> 0:13:59.960 build a piece of the Second Avenue subway. They will 0:14:00.080 --> 0:14:02.520 know that it's going to change, but it's going to 0:14:02.600 --> 0:14:06.560 take a year for the procurement process to effectuate that change. 0:14:06.880 --> 0:14:09.880 So they build something knowing that at the end of 0:14:09.880 --> 0:14:11.719 it they're going to be told to rip it up 0:14:11.800 --> 0:14:15.199 and rebuild it again under some new way. But they 0:14:15.240 --> 0:14:17.120 have to do it and the contractors if they don't 0:14:17.120 --> 0:14:24.520 do is happening Here my conversation with Tom Wright, Corey Johnson, 0:14:24.680 --> 0:14:29.360 and Nicole Julinas at Here's the Thing dot org after 0:14:29.400 --> 0:14:33.120 the Break, Michael Sisitski and I discuss whether the calls 0:14:33.200 --> 0:14:38.160 to defund the police will help keep communities, especially communities 0:14:38.200 --> 0:14:55.200 of color safe. I'm Alec Baldwin, and you're listening to 0:14:55.320 --> 0:14:59.240 Here's the Thing. Activists around the country have been calling 0:14:59.280 --> 0:15:04.000 for defund the police. As a result, more than twenty cities, 0:15:04.080 --> 0:15:08.720 including Austin, Minneapolis, and Seattle, have made efforts to reduce 0:15:08.800 --> 0:15:13.440 their police budgets and increase funds for social services. However, 0:15:13.560 --> 0:15:18.280 Michael Sasitski says that's not really working anywhere yet. I 0:15:18.280 --> 0:15:20.480 can say some of the places that you noted are 0:15:20.880 --> 0:15:23.960 places that have made bigger strides than say New York, 0:15:24.320 --> 0:15:26.520 and the kind of defunding that we've seen in those 0:15:26.520 --> 0:15:30.360 departments there is a shift away from over reliance on 0:15:30.520 --> 0:15:35.600 police as kind of the default solution to every societal ill. 0:15:36.200 --> 0:15:39.320 But it's all very much a work in progress, and 0:15:39.600 --> 0:15:41.960 I think part of what we're grappling with as we're 0:15:42.000 --> 0:15:44.680 trying to identify, you know, how do you shift police 0:15:44.760 --> 0:15:48.760 out of homeless outreach, out of mental health responses, out 0:15:48.800 --> 0:15:53.040 of their kind of ever present presence in schools is 0:15:53.160 --> 0:15:55.840 you know, we are not able to point to a 0:15:55.920 --> 0:15:58.640 real model of the place that has done everything right, 0:15:58.920 --> 0:16:02.040 but there are individual pieces that we're trying to replicate 0:16:02.040 --> 0:16:04.560 and build on. And you know, you look outside the 0:16:04.640 --> 0:16:07.640 US and you see that there are entire countries that 0:16:07.760 --> 0:16:12.280 have fewer instances of police killings of members of the 0:16:12.280 --> 0:16:15.960 public in an entire year than a police department here 0:16:16.160 --> 0:16:18.200 would get through in the course of a week. And 0:16:18.280 --> 0:16:21.240 you look at how they've structured these departments to have 0:16:21.440 --> 0:16:24.320 less of a focus on officers playing the role of 0:16:24.400 --> 0:16:28.040 kind of warriors against communities, of this war on crime 0:16:28.080 --> 0:16:32.920 mentality where officers are heavily armed, they're given surplus military equipment, 0:16:33.280 --> 0:16:35.480 And it's this idea that in most places of the 0:16:35.520 --> 0:16:40.440 US police are so heavily militarized, and they incorporate that 0:16:40.600 --> 0:16:45.400 militarization framework into every aspect of their work. You know, 0:16:45.680 --> 0:16:49.320 one thing that always strikes me about this issue in 0:16:49.400 --> 0:16:52.600 New York especially is this notion that, you know, the 0:16:52.640 --> 0:16:56.280 President of the United States, the only individual who was 0:16:56.320 --> 0:16:58.920 elected to office by all of the people in this country, 0:16:59.000 --> 0:17:01.040 is the commander in chief of the military. We have 0:17:01.760 --> 0:17:05.560 civilian control of the military, and I'm wondering if the 0:17:05.600 --> 0:17:07.720 same thing applies to the City of New York, where 0:17:07.720 --> 0:17:11.000 we have civilian control of the police department. Why does 0:17:11.080 --> 0:17:14.560 someone like the Blasio and de Blasio, of course, has 0:17:14.640 --> 0:17:17.880 a very troubled relationship with the police department, I mean, 0:17:17.880 --> 0:17:20.320 turning their back on him at funerals and stuff, whether 0:17:20.400 --> 0:17:22.840 in there. These are the things that they do on 0:17:22.920 --> 0:17:25.760 the record, And I don't know why it is the 0:17:25.800 --> 0:17:29.640 police have been allowed to achieve this kind of supra 0:17:30.040 --> 0:17:33.320 regulatory status within the government of the City of New York. 0:17:33.760 --> 0:17:35.800 There's a laws and regulations that apply to the fire 0:17:35.840 --> 0:17:39.400 Department and to the Sanitation Department into other city services, 0:17:39.560 --> 0:17:42.160 and none of that applied. The police are like the Kremlin. 0:17:42.680 --> 0:17:45.240 It's it's its own fiefdom inside the city. Would you 0:17:45.280 --> 0:17:48.639 agree with that, I would agree. I mean, in theory, 0:17:48.920 --> 0:17:52.800 the Police Commissioner is an agency official of just like 0:17:52.840 --> 0:17:56.560 any other executive agency in New York City in theory, 0:17:56.760 --> 0:18:00.639 accountable to the mayor. In practice, what we've seen is 0:18:01.359 --> 0:18:04.919 deference given to this agency unlike the difference shown to 0:18:05.000 --> 0:18:09.080 any other New York City entity of government. The NYPD 0:18:09.920 --> 0:18:13.760 has kind of unique among city agencies, basically been given 0:18:13.760 --> 0:18:17.800 the authority to exercise a veto over city Council legislation 0:18:17.880 --> 0:18:20.800 and other forms of oversight. You know, I think back 0:18:20.840 --> 0:18:23.000 to one of the first campaigns that I worked on 0:18:23.280 --> 0:18:25.800 at the end my c l U when I started 0:18:25.800 --> 0:18:30.160 back in was this package of bills called the Right 0:18:30.160 --> 0:18:33.280 to No Act, which were really basic measures in the 0:18:33.280 --> 0:18:37.200 city Council. They were requirements that officers identify themselves, give 0:18:37.200 --> 0:18:40.639 out business cards and encounters, let people know like what 0:18:40.680 --> 0:18:43.880 the reasons are for stops, and to let people know 0:18:44.160 --> 0:18:48.080 when they're being asked to consent to searches. Really basic stuff, 0:18:48.160 --> 0:18:52.560 not actually changing anything fundamental about what officers can or 0:18:52.560 --> 0:18:56.800 can't do, but being more transparent in interactions, which you know, 0:18:57.040 --> 0:19:00.479 in theory could help improve police community relationship because you're 0:19:00.520 --> 0:19:03.480 actually getting to know who these officers are. You're understanding 0:19:03.520 --> 0:19:07.560 what these encounters entail. I wonder how frustrating it is 0:19:07.640 --> 0:19:10.080 for the incoming chief of the New York City Police 0:19:10.080 --> 0:19:12.560 Department to realize that the head of the union has 0:19:12.600 --> 0:19:14.960 more power than you do, that the head of the union, 0:19:14.960 --> 0:19:17.199 the police union, is that one really calling the shots. 0:19:17.560 --> 0:19:21.080 What do you think the Blasio did or did not 0:19:21.280 --> 0:19:24.960 do during his term? He's almost done with his second term. 0:19:25.080 --> 0:19:27.440 What did you think he did or did not do 0:19:28.000 --> 0:19:30.880 to help manage the police or did he not even 0:19:31.040 --> 0:19:34.080 bother to try to manage the police? Yeah? I think 0:19:34.080 --> 0:19:36.840 there was maybe an opening where this is someone who 0:19:36.920 --> 0:19:40.320 ran on a platform about ending the tail of two 0:19:40.400 --> 0:19:45.119 cities in New York, on reigning in unconstitutional stops, on 0:19:45.640 --> 0:19:48.480 having a police department that would take a fundamentally different 0:19:48.480 --> 0:19:51.719 approach than what we saw under Giuliani and Bloomberg. And 0:19:51.800 --> 0:19:53.840 maybe that was the intention for a while, but it 0:19:53.880 --> 0:19:56.439 didn't last long. If that ever was the case. The 0:19:56.560 --> 0:19:59.959 point at which officers turned their backs on the mayor 0:20:00.119 --> 0:20:04.399 at that funeral seemed to be the moment where this 0:20:04.520 --> 0:20:07.560 administration gave up on trying to get control of the 0:20:07.600 --> 0:20:11.640 police department and We saw from that point forward efforts 0:20:11.680 --> 0:20:15.240 to block the City Council from passing really basic police 0:20:15.240 --> 0:20:20.000 transparency measures. We saw the administration basically object to any 0:20:20.040 --> 0:20:23.200 attempt at legislative oversight of the department, and we saw 0:20:23.480 --> 0:20:26.919 the administration take its new interpretation of fifty A to 0:20:26.960 --> 0:20:30.640 start blocking and withholding more records of police accountability. This 0:20:30.840 --> 0:20:34.119 is a mayor who, as his first police commissioner, brought 0:20:34.119 --> 0:20:37.240 in the architect of broken windows policing from the Giuliani 0:20:37.359 --> 0:20:41.919 era and has stayed committed to that approach, which just 0:20:42.080 --> 0:20:46.680 proportionately leads to more police contact and criminalization of poor 0:20:46.680 --> 0:20:50.080 people in communities of color, and has never really diverged 0:20:50.119 --> 0:20:53.760 from that track. So, you know, there's not been really 0:20:53.880 --> 0:20:57.760 much of a solid effort from the administration that we've 0:20:57.760 --> 0:21:01.920 seen here in New York City to actually fundamentally transformed policing. 0:21:02.280 --> 0:21:04.200 A lot of it ended up being more of the same. 0:21:04.760 --> 0:21:06.600 I want to get back to something, which is I'm 0:21:06.600 --> 0:21:09.280 not one of these liberal Democrats who thinks that Obama 0:21:09.400 --> 0:21:12.159 is the lyricist for all of our anthems here in 0:21:12.200 --> 0:21:15.159 the world. But at the same time Obama and I 0:21:15.200 --> 0:21:17.800 agree with him that the phrase defund the police's bad 0:21:17.840 --> 0:21:21.119 optics for this idea of reform. Do you think to 0:21:21.160 --> 0:21:24.160 fund the police is the best wording for that movement? 0:21:24.680 --> 0:21:28.719 I think defund is important as a message, and I 0:21:28.760 --> 0:21:32.040 get that there are concerns about the optics, concerns about 0:21:32.040 --> 0:21:35.600 how it lands when you're trying to convey what it means. 0:21:35.600 --> 0:21:39.600 But I think the focus on defunding the police is 0:21:39.800 --> 0:21:43.160 critical because it keeps the focus on the fact that 0:21:43.520 --> 0:21:49.520 police departments have dramatically expanded their budgets, their functions as 0:21:49.680 --> 0:21:53.439 other agencies that are better equipped to handle things like 0:21:53.520 --> 0:21:58.359 public health, education, housing. As all of those agencies have 0:21:58.440 --> 0:22:02.639 been defunded, we have been in consciously putting that money 0:22:02.720 --> 0:22:07.080 into police departments, expanding their scope, expanding their powers. And 0:22:07.280 --> 0:22:09.840 that is at the root of a lot of these problems, 0:22:10.119 --> 0:22:13.679 is how much we're over investing in police. But you 0:22:13.720 --> 0:22:16.199 and I get it, But so many Americans, have you 0:22:16.280 --> 0:22:18.800 defund the polices, You're going to abolish the police? Have 0:22:18.880 --> 0:22:21.159 you found that to be true. I've certainly heard that, 0:22:21.200 --> 0:22:24.119 and I think you know it's a complicated call, and 0:22:24.160 --> 0:22:28.520 it's one that does merit really in depth discussion public education, 0:22:28.960 --> 0:22:32.040 and that's on advocates to do the hard work of 0:22:32.119 --> 0:22:36.600 explaining what defund means and why it makes sense, why 0:22:36.640 --> 0:22:40.040 it's going to lead to the types of improvements we 0:22:40.040 --> 0:22:42.480 want to see in other areas and other services. So 0:22:42.520 --> 0:22:45.200 I don't disagree that it is complicated, that it takes 0:22:45.240 --> 0:22:47.840 a lot to move the public needle on this, but 0:22:47.960 --> 0:22:50.760 it is. You know, we talk about defunding the police 0:22:51.119 --> 0:22:55.040 because of the active harm that police are causing and 0:22:55.119 --> 0:22:59.080 inflicting on communities because they have been given such outsize power, 0:22:59.200 --> 0:23:02.359 outsize reese forces, and gets to a point where a 0:23:02.400 --> 0:23:05.200 lot of the calls that come back to reform or 0:23:05.320 --> 0:23:07.840 fixed or all of these things, they've been kind of 0:23:07.880 --> 0:23:11.359 the call for years, and we've seen that they haven't 0:23:11.440 --> 0:23:15.080 produced the types of change that are really needed to 0:23:15.200 --> 0:23:18.960 protect communities from the worst excesses of police violence. Some 0:23:19.040 --> 0:23:21.119 of the reforms that have long been called changes to 0:23:21.200 --> 0:23:23.520 things like use of force policies. You know, if we 0:23:23.680 --> 0:23:27.800 just better document force, if we better regulate tactics like 0:23:27.880 --> 0:23:30.240 chokeholds and banned chokeholds, that we're going to see a 0:23:30.280 --> 0:23:34.840 reduction in their use and against communities. But that hasn't 0:23:34.880 --> 0:23:38.560