Senate still split on qualified immunity
Police reform debate rages on
A stalemate over changes to qualified immunity protections proposed in the Senate’s police reform bill has split Democrats as lawmakers rush to pass the bill after days of delays.
“The provision in this bill that speaks to qualified immunity does not just speak to police union members. It speaks to all public employees — if you’re a mental health worker working at Taunton State Hospital, you lose the qualified immunity that you used to have before this bill if it passes with this language,” said Taunton Democrat Sen. Marc Pacheco from the Senate floor on Monday.
It’s language Senate President Karen Spilka and Sen. Willliam Brownsberger — both Democrats — have fiercely defended.
The Senate bill would end qualified immunity for police except in cases where “no reasonable defendant could have had reason to believe that such conduct would violate the law,” according to the bill language.
Brownsberger described the change as “narrow,” saying as the law stands now, police officers can only be held personally liable if “what you did is illegal or not clearly established under the law … or precedent.”
Pacheco is one of eight Democratic lawmakers breaking ranks and asking Senate leaders slow down efforts to fast-track the bill and get it passed by the end of the session later this month.
“We’ve got to get our arms around conveying to people what it is we’re trying to do with this bill. What’s really in this bill. And I’m afraid that we may have lost that battle already,” Sen. John Keenan, D-Quincy, said during debate on Friday.
“That in a society where people are going further and further apart, we find ourselves right in the middle of that,” Keenan added. “Not in the middle trying to draw people together, but with a bill that is wellintentioned, has good things, but for whatever reason is driving people apart.”
Collectively, Senate Democrats have signed onto four amendments striking limitations of qualified immunity, creating commissions to study the issue or both.
In total, senators filed 145 amendments — dragging debate out late into the night on Monday.
Republican Sen. Ryan Fattman delayed earlier debate on the bill for three consecutive days beginning last Thursday, invoking a procedural tool to table the legislation three separate times — something Pacheco and other Democrats said they agreed with.
Senate Democrats are working to fast-track the bill with less than three weeks before the end of formal sessions. The reform package comes amid a wave of national protests triggered by the Memorial Day killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis Police.
Much of the bill has a consensus of support both among lawmakers and police groups — something Senate Minority Leader Bruce Tarr called on Spilka to seize on.
“If we can focus on the things that unify us as opposed to the things that divide us that we can move forward,” he said.