More than a dozen current or former police officers have been charged in connection with the Jan. 6 attack. And on Monday, in a speech to Black law enforcement leaders, President Joe Biden didn’t mince words as he condemned traitorous officers and drew a line in the sand for America’s police.
“You can’t be pro-insurrection and pro-cop,” he said in virtual remarks to the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives conference. “You can’t be pro-insurrection and pro-democracy. You can’t be pro-insurrection and pro-American.”
There’s great significance in the group Biden chose to address with this statement: Black police. Several Black and brown people were among the heroic officers who defended the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. The list includes Sgts. Harry Dunn and Aquilino Gonell, who allegedly faced racial slurs and allegations they were traitors as the pro-Trump mob (including some police officers) descended upon them.
And that conflict underscored a tension among law enforcement officials that boiled over on Jan. 6: the tension between Black officers and others committed to the work of public safety, and some white officers who see policing as a way to enforce a racist hierarchy. To be sure, these racial tensions are why some police unions still remain segregated.
Biden’s reference to Jan. 6 and his distinction between good and bad cops was essential in clarifying what we ought to expect from police officers: safety, not sedition. And on top of that, his comments were valuable in dispelling the myth that conservatives — and former President Donald Trump in particular — truly care about officers’ well-being. Officers were speared, sprayed, stomped on and brutalized that day, Biden said, adding that “lives were lost.”
“And for three hours, the defeated former president of the United States watched it all happen as he sat in the comfort of the private dining room next to the Oval Office,” Biden said.
He appears to have watched the latest Jan. 6 hearing, which focused heavily on Trump’s refusal to quell the riot as his supporters effectively waged war on police guarding the Capitol.
“While he was doing that, brave law enforcement officers were subject to medieval hell for three hours. Dripping in blood. Surrounded by carnage,” Biden said, noting they faced off against a mob motivated by Trump’s lies.
“Donald Trump lacked the courage to act,” he said. “The brave women and men in blue all across this nation should never forget that.”
Watch Biden’s full remarks below:
Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog.