Trump's Police Reform Order Is Pathetically Weak

Donald Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday to "reform" the policing of America, but his order is really nothing more than lip service to a country that is desperate for reform. The order doesn't actually create any new way to hold officers accountable, nor does it strip them of their military-grade weaponry. There is extra training involved, but even that doesn't address the real problems that we are seeing right now. Ring of Fire's Farron Cousins discusses this.

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*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.

So yesterday, Donald Trump issued an executive order that, uh, is basically a reform, uh, for policing here in the United States. He announced it during a Rose garden ceremony, he was surrounded by police officers, uniformed police officers. So the whole thing looked like super official. The police were behind him. So he looked like he had the support of the police on this measure. The entire thing was for show, uh, let's, let's start off by just saying that this was absolutely a performance by somebody who's not very good at these type of things. And what it does, what this executive order does is essentially nothing. This executive order is not going to do anything to help the problems that we have with policing in the United States today. But the reason Trump did it and I'll get into some of the specifics in a moment. But I do have to say this first, the reason this is even happening is because Trump understands things in this country for him are a little bit out of control.

He sees that he is under water in the handling of the protest. Most people agree with what the protesters are saying. So the polls are against him there. Cause he has been with police since day one, not with the protestors. And so he has to do something to make it seem like he is addressing the situation and siding with the protestors. But what he did with this executive order did is protect police. He even ended his little a speech, which went for almost 40 minutes. They're in the Rose garden by saying we are for law and order the public wants law and order, and we're gonna give it to you. So even ended it by taking another jab at the, uh, at the protesters, at the people to manding reform of the police in the United States, he took another shot at them. So yeah, I'm sure that's going to go over really well with this. Um, but here is what, and I'm just going to read this word for word from a Washington post here. The text of Trump's orders, stipulated that attorney general William Barr will be charged with leveraging federal grant funding to encourage, encourage local police departments, to pursue certifications in newly established best practices regarding use of force and deescalation techniques, including the prohibition of choke holds, except in those situations where the use of deadly force is allowed by law.

So we're gonna encourage police officers to get more training. Um, and also don't kill people unless you feel like you need to kill people. Um, those things already exist. Um, that's why whenever there is a death at the hands of a police officer, there's always an investigation, right? The problem is not that we're not investigating these things. The problem is that the entire system is rigged to where the cops never get punished for it. Okay? The investigation, the, you know, grand jury getting those done, that's not the problem. The problem is that it's all incestuous, right? And the prosecutors also have to work hand in hand with these cops all across the country. These are their friends, their buddies. They go out drinking with them after work. You think they're going to prosecute these people fairly. You think they're going to truly investigate them?