Statement on the killing of Daunte Wright
From 1920 to 1938 a flag was flown outside the NAACP’s national office in New York whenever a black man was lynched. It read simply, “A man was lynched yesterday.” Some may like to imagine that we have made progress on America’s long road to racial justice, but lynchings by white mobs have only been replaced by unabated police killings, which invariably happen in the course of subduing Black and brown communities.
On Sunday, just outside Minneapolis, while Derek Chauvin is still awaiting justice for the depraved murder of George Floyd, another man was lynched by police. We don’t use this term lightly. The killing was a direct consequence of how the largely white police force interacts with citizens in a majority-minority community.
This time it was another unarmed black man, a 20 year-old father named Daunte Wright, who told his mother minutes before he was shot that he was being targeted with a pretextual stop regarding the air freshener dangling from his mirror.
Within minutes Kim Potter, a veteran police officer, unhappy with Wright’s attitude and “non-compliance,” screamed “Taser! Taser! Taser!” and shot Wright with her service revolver instead of “shutting him down” with the Taser’s 50,000 volts.
Once again city residents are paying the price for reckless, racist policing. A dusk to dawn curfew was imposed and the mayor of Brooklyn Center, Minnesota has assumed control of the police force. No doubt there will eventually be a multi-million dollar settlement with a city that spent nearly 40% of its 2020 tax revenue on police despite historically low crime rates — while spending only 7% on Community Development. More money that will never benefit the community.
All over America we are seeing not only the ugly face of selective, racist policing, but insane expenditures for over-policing, lack of accountability, and lack of progress in ending the needless killings. No matter how much training the 26-year veteran officer received, and no matter whether she mistook her service weapon for a Taser, the killing of Daunte Wright was a result not of individual error — but a direct consequence of the way America polices Black and brown communities.
Some will paint this as another unfortunate police interaction with a high school dropout who got what he deserved by mouthing off to officers who had no choice but to make him comply — using a device that the United Nations considers to be an implement of torture. But make no mistake — a man was lynched by the police. This was a killing that resulted from a questionable stop combined with police authoritarianism and routine violence against communities of color.
If not happening already, Wright’s history and character will be examined under a microscope. Police will promise to improve officer training. Commissions and studies will be created. But unless Brooklyn Center and communities all over the country have truly had enough — and they take concrete action to change how officers are hired, fired, and disciplined, and how police departments are allocated funds and managed — nothing will ever change.
All this spilled blood should tell us that 21st Century policing in America is not working. The NAACP agrees with the Biden administration that no new studies are needed to examine the failures of American policing. We know what’s wrong, and we know what has to change. Police reform, which must include ending the police impunity called Qualified Immunity, is long overdue. And making police forces truly accountable to the communities they serve remains the greatest challenge.
America doesn’t need the bad policing it has. America doesn’t need explosions of grief and rage that inevitably occur after repeated police killings. America doesn’t need candlelight vigils any more than it needs riots or the empty thoughts and prayers that politicians routinely offer.
What America really needs is meaningful police reform now. If not yesterday.
