Lawmakers fail to reach deal on police reforms

MINNEAPOLIS — Political leaders in Minnesota promised sweeping changes after George Floyd’s killing turned their state into a focal point for nationwide fury and grief over police killings and racism.

But those efforts collapsed Saturday as leaders in the Minnesota Legislature — the only one in the country where Democrats control one chamber and Republicans the other — failed to compromise on a package of lawenforcement measures before a special session ended.

Ultimately, legislators could not reach a deal that reconciled the Democrats’ calls for farreaching changes to police oversight with Republican leaders who supported a short

er list of “commonsense police reforms” that included banning choke holds in most situations and requiring officers to stop their colleagues from using unreasonable force.

Democrats said the plan passed by the Republicanled Senate consisted of tepid halfsteps that were already in place in most lawenforcement agencies and did not rise to the moment’s calls for dramatic action. Republicans balked at the proposals passed by the Democratcontrolled House to restore voting rights to tens of thousands of felons and put the state’s attorney general, Keith Ellison, a Democrat, in charge of prosecuting police killings.

Democrats had argued they should stay in session as long as they needed to reach a compromise. Republicans set a deadline of Friday night before returning to their districts.

As the clock ticked toward midnight — and then far past it — leaders of both parties blamed each other in competing news conferences. Paul Gazelka, the Republican leader of the Senate, described the state of negotiations as essentially hopeless.

“If they’re not interested in this,” Gazelka said, “I don’t think personally that they’ll ever be interested in something that we can agree to.”

Moments later, Jeff Hayden,

a Democratic state senator whose district includes the corner where Floyd was killed, said the Republican plan was unacceptable. “If they decide to leave here without getting anything done, it’s on their hands,” he said.

The Legislature’s failure to pass a bill was a disheartening turn for activists.

“Every time someone gets killed, there are promises, investigations, and nothing comes of it,” said Dave Bicking of Communities United Against Police Brutality.

Nicholas BogelBurroughs and Jack Healy are New York Times writers.