[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 65 (Wednesday, April 19, 2023)] [House] [Pages H1852-H1858] From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
Date: 2023-04-19
Chamber: HOUSE
Mr. RASKIN: I yield myself such time as I may consume. The good chairman of the committee invoked the name of Mayor Muriel Bowser, the Mayor of the District of Columbia, who sent us a letter with the chairman of the D.C. City Council, Phil Mendelson, which closes this way: ``Not only should our policy decisions not be overturned by officials not elected to represent our residents, but piecemeal interference hurts our ability to confront crime and improve public safety in the District of Columbia.''  What is this about, Mr. Speaker? H.J. Res. 42 seeks to nullify a law passedunanimously by the Council of the District of Columbia to promote accountability for police officers who use excessive force or abuse their power, a goal that the vast majority of Americans share. The D.C. law banned the use of choke holds and other dangerous neck restraints and set reasonable standards on the use of deadly force. It required the public release of body-worn camera footage and created a police officer misconduct database for officers who have been convicted of a crime or had allegations against them civilly or administratively sustained. It prohibited D.C. from hiring officers who have engaged in criminal or official misconduct. Most importantly for these purposes, Mr. Speaker, the new law empowered the chief of police to fire or discipline officers who break the law by removing police disciplinary matters from the control of arbitrators under collective bargaining. This is the provision that galvanized opposition to the bill from the police union, the key provision that has now led our colleagues to want to convert the Congress of the United States into the largest city council in the world, a 535-member city council with the job of micromanaging and superintending the work of the 13-member Council of the District of Columbia. The local police union hates this provision, which is their right, of course. Their chief has been the chief lobbyist against Washington, D.C., on this law. He was the key GOP witness in the Oversight Committee hearing on the law. His union sued when the legislation was first passed, asserting that it violated the U.S. Constitution not to subject the discipline of police officers to an outside arbitrator. They lost in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, they lost in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, and the Supreme Court did not grant cert. Still, the union is running TV ads against this law and has obviously found friends on that side of the aisle. Now, in their eagerness to kick around the more than 700,000 taxpaying American citizens who live in Washington, D.C., but have no voting representation in the House of Representatives or in the U.S. Senate, our colleagues are embracing a claim that puts them in favor of an extreme police union position on discipline that jurisdictions across America are debating and many of them are rejecting. Why? Well, D.C. is a good example. Before passage of this law that they propose to repeal, the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department had been forced by labor arbitrators to rehire a significant number of policemen and -women who had been fired for engaging in serious criminal misconduct. Here are some examples of the officers who were fired but the department was forced to reinstate by an arbitrator. One officer illegally struck a suspect multiple times in the head. The officer was criminally tried and convicted of criminal assault, sentenced to 30 days in jail, 3 years of probation, and 500 hours of community service. Despite strong opposition from the police department, he was reinstated by an arbitrator. Another officer, off duty at the time, sexually assaulted a woman and was convicted of misdemeanor sex abuse and sentenced to a 100-day suspended sentence and a year of probation. Despite strong opposition from the department, he was reinstated to the force by an arbitrator. Another off-duty police officer confessed to abusing a child. The officer was convicted of child abuse and sentenced to 5 years of probation. Despite strong opposition from the department, he was reinstated, as well. Every D.C. police chief for at least the last 25 years has expressed outrage about the old system of having to rehire bad cops after they had been fired for perpetrating serious misconduct against the people of Washington, D.C. Former D.C. Police Chief Peter Newsham openly lamented that he had to allow ``very bad police officers back onto our department.'' Former Police Chief Charles Ramsey said this: ``It is demoralizing to the rank and file who really do not want to have those kinds of people in their ranks. It causes a tremendous amount of anxiety in the public. Our credibility is shot whenever these things happen.'' The current D.C. Police Chief, Robert Contee, says that giving the police the power over discipline reduces the risk of returning poor performers to the force. Forcing police chiefs to reinstate bad cops fired for breaking the law is bad for public safety, it is bad for community morale, and it is bad for the morale of the vast majority of good cops who are doing their job. It is also bad for taxpayers. Between 2010 and 2020, The Washington Post found that D.C. paid out $91 million to resolve claims of police brutality and misconduct. The taxpayers are also on the hook for backpay that was paid out to bad cops who were fired for this misconduct when they were rehired following the ruling of an arbitrator. In a recent 5-year period, the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department was forced to rehire 36 officers. According to an Office of the D.C. Auditor report, D.C. had to pay $14.3 million in backpay to these convicted and disciplined officers. The question of whether police chiefs or arbitrators should be the ones to decide to put disciplined cops back on the force is a matter for local decisionmaking in Washington as it is in every other jurisdiction in the country. Mr. Speaker, 700,000 taxpaying American citizens have decided through their elected representatives that the chief of police, who is appointed by the Mayor of the District of Columbia, should be the one to be able to discipline bad actors within the police department. Reversing the D.C. government on this local matter is outrageous interference by Congress to impose a bad public policy on the Capital City. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.