US Democrats Present Police Bill Amid George Floyd's Protests

United States Democrats unveiled Monday a new bill, titled 'Justice in Policing Act of 2020', was unveiled at a Capitol Hill news conference by several senators led by Karen Bass, chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus.

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“Never again should the world be subjected to witnessing what we saw on the streets in Minneapolis: the slow murder of an individual by a uniformed police officer," said senator Bass who also referred to the legislation as "a bold, transformative vision of policing in America.”

The police reform bill would ban chokeholds, establish a national database to track police misconduct and prohibit certain no-knock warrants.

According to the 134-page document, it would also be a requisite the use of body cameras by federal law enforcement officers, and restriction of lethal force.

Particularly, the bill contains several provisions that would make it easier to hold officers accountable for misconduct in civil and criminal court, a change largely claimed by civil rights advocates as, under the legal doctrine of "qualified immunity", officers are chield from lawsuits.

The legislation also would limit the transfer of military-grade equipment to state and local authorities, and make lynching a federal crime.

However, the bill does not address calls by protesters to defund police departments. Decisions about department funding levels are left at the state and local levels although some democrats have said this will be taking into account in subsequent legislations.

Before the unveiling of the legislation, House and Senate Democrats led by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, met in the Capitol’s Emancipation Hall to take a knee and make silence for eight minutes and 46 seconds, a symbolic act as this was the time that elapsed when a Minneapolis police officer pressed his knee into George Floyd’s neck.