House passes police bill
Compromises with Senate still to be ironed out
The Massachusetts House of Representatives passed its version of a police reform bill late Friday night, setting the stage for negotiations between Legislative leaders to try to work through the differences between this and the Senate’s bill.
The House passed the bill by a 93-66 vote after 10 p.m. Friday.
The House version follows the Senate’s also-nighttime passage of its own bill late last week. Both bills focus on more training and oversight of officers and limits on use of force, but the Senate’s is more sweeping, with cuts to qualified immunity, the legal doctrine that prevents many lawsuits against individual police officers.
Legislative leaders will now meet in conference committee to try to hammer out the differences between the two bills, with the goal of sending an agreed-upon version to Gov. Charlie Baker’s desk. This House margin would not be enough to override a veto is the governor ultimately decided to scrap the bill.
House Speaker Bob DeLeo said in a statement, “Change is never easy, but with this vote, the House of Representatives acts to ensure fairness and equality. It is the product of countless hours of conversations with a wide swath of stakeholders, including the members of the Massachusetts Black and Latino Legislative Caucus.”
State Rep. Nika Elugardo, a Boston Democrat who’s a major proponent of reform, said, “It’s a historic turn away from a mindset that accepts a lower standard of life and liberty for black, indigenous and other people of color. Now the real work begins to dismantle structural racism from within.”
But the House version left some progressive activists in the cold.
The ACLU said in a statement, “Ultimately, this piece of legislation misses the mark, because it will not help victims of violence hold police accountable. Let’s be clear: Massachusetts is not immune to police misconduct. In order to make any laws about excessive use of force or other police abuses meaningful, Massachusetts must reform our civil rights laws—including by ending qualified immunity, which denies victims their day in court.”
Legislative leaders also continue to face pressure and backlash from police unions and associations as the debate over reform legislation continues. The Massachusetts Chiefs of Police Association, a group of nearly 400 municipal and campus law enforcement executives and commanders, has labeled both branches’ proposals a “knee-jerk reaction,” and said the group continues “to be hurt, horrified and confused.”