Presumptive Democratic Presidential Candidate Joe Biden does not support defunding the police, even as calls to do so mount by progressive Democrats.
Biden told “CBS Evening News” anchor Norah O’Donnell on Monday flat out that he does not support defunding police, but he does support basing federal aid on “certain basic standards of decency and honorableness.”
“No, I don’t support defunding the police,” Biden told O’Donnell. “I support conditioning federal aid to police, based on whether or not they meet certain basic standards of decency and honorableness. And, in fact, are able to demonstrate they can protect the community and everybody in the community.”
Biden’s campaign echoed this sentiment on Monday in a statement to reporters by campaign spokesman Andrew Bates.
“As his criminal justice proposal made clear months ago, Vice President Biden does not believe that police should be defunded,” Bates said. “Biden supports the urgent need for reform — including funding for public schools, summer programs, and mental health and substance abuse treatment separate from funding for policing — so that officers can focus on the job of policing.”
Biden would instead like to take a fix what’s already there approach, with increased funding to police departments for training, body cams, and more diverse hiring practices.⠀⠀
Calls to defund the police by activists have come amid nationwide protests against police brutality in the weeks since George Floyd was killed by a Minneapolis police officer who knelt on his neck for over eight minutes.
The movement is starting to gain momentum with the Minneapolis City Council voting to disband the existing police department and rebuild from scratch instead of trying to fix what was already in place. New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio announced that he would cut funds from the New York Police Department and invest it back into communities. And Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti also committed to cut $150 million from their police budget for the coming year.
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