So I don't know that any law, any training, any reform is gonna change.
This man was handcuffed, they continued to beat him.
The fact that we saw that these individuals,
these five individuals did not have any respect for life.
And again, I don't think these five guys represent the vast,
vast majority of law enforcement, but I don't know if there's anything you can do
to stop the kind of evil we saw in that video.
So here's why I'm already immediately worried about the prospect for the tragic,
needless killing of Tyre Nichols to have any effect federally.
If someone like Jim Jordan who wants to be seen as a reasonable person here,
he's saying that it's tragic, it's evil.
All of that.
He's actually talking about this one, because in this case the cops are black.
So he feels ideologically freed up to criticize them.
It's just evil.
And the cool thing about labeling is just evil, is if you just do that,
then you don't have to do anything, because evil is impossible to get rid of.
It's a faith thing.
It's a metaphysical thing.
Is it evil?
Yeah, I think it is evil.
Is it also something that we should try to regulate?
Yeah, I really do think that we should and
he's willing to at least talk about the possibility of regulations as you'll see.
But you'll immediately see in his responses how general he wants them to be,
how scared of the specifics he is.
So take a look at this.
>> It sounds like you are not for any new federal regulation.
Well there's there's things we can do.
I think there's all kinds of grant dollars that go out.
There's a form that can happen there.
We offered amendments to a bill, Tim Scott had legislation that wasn't what
the democrats brought forward a few years ago.
So I think there's some things we can look at, but
it's just a difference in I think philosophy, the democrats always think
that it's it's a new law that's gonna fix something that terrible.
We kind of think that that's, [CROSSTALK].
>> I get the ideological,
I think that Tim Scott bill had a lot of financial incentives.
>> Sure did. >> And the George Floyd bill was some
mandatory, but let me go through why not a federal ban on chokeholds?
That seems to be, that's agreed upon, right,
you're comfortable with full federal ban on chokeholds for police officers?
>> I'm for the best training possible, but what I'm not for is what we saw there.
I don't know that any training any ban, there was no chokeholds used there,
what they did there was just continue to beat this Mr Nichols, and so
I don't know if that's the answer.
Okay, so he doesn't think that it might have helped here.
Okay, maybe, I guess, they were holding him though.
Maybe it wasn't a chokehold.
You know what chuck Todd is saying there.
And I don't like to have to defend Chuck Todd,
but you know the point that he was making there.
But, so you think that we should just leave it in place,
you think that there are any circumstances in which trying to choke the life out of
a person is a good thing for a cop to do?
He appears to, no, no, no specific regulations, something, we'll talk briefly
about it, until I'm gonna check every day and see if people have moved on from this.
And then once they have, we will.
That's what Jordan Jordan is saying right there.
Francesca, what do you think?
>> I have to say I find it disgusting that Jim Jordan
rolls into Chuck Todd interview and just combs his hair extra nice,
and he's probably the calmest we've ever seen Jim Jordan.
Now suddenly, man it's a real shame, it's almost like he's about to laugh,
why, because these are black cops, they killed a black man.
Wow it's kind of just like it's black on black crime.
That's what his calm, you know what I'm saying,
do do eating grin that he's got going on there,
is basically like well, it's just black on black crime.
No, no, no, it's blue on black crime you guys, that's what,
it is the system of policing that killed Tyre Nichols.
It is not individuals, they were just doing the bidding of what honestly
the entire system tells them that it's okay to do.
It's just one more black life.
You can, yeah, you can take it, that's totally fine.
And so it just grosses me out that Jim Jordan, first of all, you're right,
he has got no intention of actually making good on any of those reforms.
And we have effectively done to police violence,
what we've done to mass shootings and gun violence.
Which is, yeah God, that sucks, evil, mental health,
anyway [SOUND] do tax write offs.
>> Basically, yeah, yeah.
And imagine if they were, imagine if they were consistent, he's like, well,
you know, it's evil and evil is always gonna be out there.
So why try to regulate it?
You guys think abortion is evil,
you don't seem to have much of a hands off approach to that.
>> Exactly. >> You think gay love is evil.
>> Yes.
>> You still feel like that should be banned.
I mean all these things are still gonna exist, right?
So why are you so gung ho to stop the one than the other?
I think we all understand it.
So anyway, he says, yeah, I know, there should be like some like voluntary
standards, but let's keep it on the state and local level.
So let's not do anything federally and let's not have,
let's not do anything on the level where I would have to do anything by the way.
Let's let the other people do it and let's just kick it to the conservative states so
they can do whatever they want.
That's what he's saying there.
And by the way, keeping it real,
in this particular area in Memphis there have been some reforms.
So back in 2021, advocates called for
a reimagined policing initiative and they did something.
So here's what they did.
De-escalation training is now required.
Clearly that needs some work.
Officers are told to limit use of force, exhaust all alternatives before resorting
to deadly force and report all uses of force.
Tennessee has also took action.
State law now requires officers to intervene to stop abuse and
report excessive force by their colleagues.
Literally any of those things could have stopped this and
literally none of those things actually happened.
They publish accountability reports by the way that also include the race of
people subjected to use of force each year in Memphis.
They showed that black men and women were overwhelmingly targeted for
rougher treatment in 2019, 2020 and 2021.
Subject to nearly 86% of the recorded uses of guns, batons, pepper spray,
physical beatings and other force back in 2021,
the total nearly doubling that year to 1700 cases.
Seven uses of force by the way ended in deaths during those three years.
My God. >> So again, obviously there needs to be
reform, but obviously reform alone doesn't guarantee that these things don't happen.
And when people say how do you reform a system like this?
I think this is the sort of evidence that's informing that,
is that the cops who were trained under the previous thing,
who believe that that's the culture they should have.
Sure you can make them go to another seminar or whatever, is that fundamentally
going to change their desire to beat the life out of a person?
>> No. >> Well, clearly not.
This is not a hypothetical, it just happened.
>> No, and exactly.
And this is, look, I'm not saying that this wasn't a baby step in the right
direction and I'm sure there was a lot of work that was put into that reform.
But I'm also pretty sure that folks like, organizers we saw who spoke out about
this case, want their city to do far more and that this was a drop in the bucket.
Why, because none of the money was taken out of the cops, if you just pour more and
more, and more money into policing, for more and more.
Like you said seminars, with some coffee and donuts in the morning and
you're talking about diversity, and you talk about de escalation in practice or
theory, whatever, right?
And you do your trainings for the media, but except they're completely unrealistic.
Because as John you said, it's not really that some crazy person jumps out at you,
it's more like some guy's like, what was I doing officer?
And they're like, that's it, get him.
No, it is about taking their money away,
because why do they have the money for an elite unit like this?
And why is that elite unit, instead of being better trained.
Better at de escalation, better with knowing how to follow one officer and
then the rest of them sort of, cool it in the background, right?
It's because that money is just going to them to operate again
with even more impunity, be even crazier than regular cops.
>> Yeah, and look, it's obviously difficult.
It is obviously very difficult.
I understand psychologically why it is hard to get a cop who might,
removed from context, did not want these things to happen,
to step in and stop four other people.
Who are in a whirlwind of bloodlust and are like, their only desire
is to get the respect they think they deserve by killing a person.
That doesn't mean you just stop and you just don't do anything, and just say,
well, evil exists, what are you gonna do?
I kind of feel like the stakes are pretty high and
we need to continue to work at it in a variety of different forms.
Reform by the way inside of the police, is just one way to do that and
not even necessarily one of the more likely ways to actually work.
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