Throughout the nation, People protesting racial injustice and police brutality — the overwhelming majority of them peacefully — have been met by
Throughout the nation, People protesting racial injustice and police brutality — the overwhelming majority of them peacefully — have been met by police forces that look extra like a military.
Officers have proven as much as protests with riot gear, armored vans, and army rifles. And this isn’t new: The protests in Ferguson, Missouri, in 2014 noticed a equally militarized response from police.
So the place did police get all these weapons?
Over a number of a long time, as a part of the warfare on medicine, the US applied insurance policies meant to carry legislation enforcement and the army nearer collectively. Essentially the most impactful of these, which started in 1990, is what’s now generally known as the 1033 Program — it allowed the army to mortgage its surplus gear to legislation enforcement companies. By the mid-1990s, native police departments throughout the US, together with even college police, had acquired gear like armored vans, computerized rifles, and grenade launchers.
As we speak that gear is normal in American police departments. However what’s modified for the reason that ’90s is that the 1033 Program now not drives the militarization of police. As we speak the tradition of militarization is baked into how the nation’s police see themselves.
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