Bad Cops Can't Be Decertified In Just Three States. Which Three Might Surprise You.

     Since the murder of George Floyd, states have worked in dozens of different ways to address police misconduct. One of the most important ways has been implementing a process for bad police officers to be decertified, which helps ensure the worst of the worst can't simply become law enforcement officers in neighboring jurisdictions after they are fired. In December 2020, Massachusetts Governor Charles Baker, a Republican, signed bipartisan legislation passed by the Democratic-led legislature that included such a provision. In September 2021, Governor Gavin Newsom, fresh from surviving his recall election, signed police decertification legislation in California.

     This leaves just three states: Hawaii, Rhode Island, and New Jersey. All three are obviously liberal blue states. All three have large majorities to match in their legislatures and all three have Democrats in their governors' mansions. Hawaii has passed only one piece of police reform legislation, publishing the records of police officers who face discipline. New Jersey's police reform has come entirely from Attorney General Gurbir Grewal, who resigned in July to become the enforcement director for the Securities and Exchange Commission. I like Mr. Grewal. The first Sikh county prosecutor, in 2018 he became America's first Sikh state attorney general and second Asian state attorney general (after Kamala Harris, who held the post in California). Grewal secured massive settlements against opioid companies and polluters, implemented strict gun control measures, launched the largest initiative targeting child sex predators in state history, abolished mandatory minimums for most nonviolent offenses, and took action to make police disciplinary and force records public information, intervene when officers demonstrate an escalating pattern of misconduct, and launch the nation's first officer mental health program. Rhode Island, meanwhile, is one of only two Democratic-led states, along with New Mexico, to take absolutely zero concrete action on police reform after George Floyd's death.

     Decertifying bad police officers is the minimum standard of maintaining public faith that LEOs will act in their best interest and be punished when they don't. If Texas, Arkansas, and Idaho can decertify officers who break the rules, Hawaii, Rhode Island, and New Jersey can, as well. This is a unique time in history. The COVID-19 pandemic (the deadliest event in American history) has highlighted strains on America's economy and families, voting rights are being suppressed to support a man who led a coup attempt against the American government, the climate crisis is putting forth the possibility that we may not exist in three decades, we are reexamining our overmilitarized foreign policy, and the U.S. is reforming the police in a reckoning on race not seen since 1968. If we fail to meet this moment, future generations will judge us harshly, and they will be right to do so.