Former President Donald Trump is mulling unprecedented protections for violent police officers accused of abusing their power, according to a new report.
The Republican presidential nominee has floated the idea in private of disbanding local police units that investigate accusations of misconduct, including corruption and civil rights violations, in local departments nationwide, a source told Rolling Stone.
"[Trump argued] many police officers spend too much time worrying that an official from internal affairs will intrusively investigate them or 'ruin' their lives simply because the officers were 'doing their job,'" Rolling Stone reported.
"Moreover, Trump has spoken frequently about offering police 'immunity from prosecution' — particularly as it relates to the central role he wants cops to play in carrying out the largest mass-deportation regime in U.S. history."
Trump reportedly began to consider this idea after accepting the endorsement of the Fraternal Order of Police last month.
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New York University Professor Ruth Ben-Ghiat, an expert on authoritarianism and "Strongmen" political leaders, told Rolling Stone she was troubled that Trump was considering such a law enforcement tit-for-tat.
“The fascists did the same thing,” Ben-Ghiat told Rolling Stone. “They made a deal with the police.”
Ben-Ghiat warned this would encourage racially disparate and brutal policing nationwide.
A 2022 Bureau of Justice Statistics report of police interactions with the public found Black, Hispanic and other non-white populations were much more likely to be treaded with aggression, Justice Department records show.
Black people were about 12 times more likely to report misconduct such as racial slurs, according to a Prison Policy Initiative analysis of the report. It also found a steep uptick in police threatening women with violence.
“These are called ‘authoritarian bargains,’” Ben-Ghiat says. “He courts the police by saying, ‘You won’t pay a price for any violence I ask you to do.’ He is arranging these things ahead of time.”
Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung did not provide more information about what the magazine described as the "former president’s Purge movie-esque policy recommendations," Rolling Stone reported.
“President Trump has always been the law and order president and he continues to reiterate the importance of enforcing existing laws,” Cheung told Rolling Stone.‘ "Otherwise it’s all-out anarchy."
