Article by Vida B. Johnson,*

As extremism grows in the United States, it also grows in policing. The growth in extremism in the police is exacerbated by core features of American policing that are undemocratic, such as a lack of accountability and the over-policing of some communities and under-policing of others. While scholars have separately addressed extremism in policing and how policing writ large might undermine democracy, there has been little scholarly attention on how these two intersect and amplify each other. I weave these two critiques into conversation.

This article highlights the urgent problem I call extremist policing and describes how it undermines democracy and democratic institutions. To illustrate the problem, I highlight four categories of law enforcement officer behavior that threaten democracy: participation in and affinity for anti-government and extremist groups, like the Oath Keepers; refusal to enforce laws with which they do not agree; interfering with elections; and attacks on the press. The article also adds important context to ongoing conversations around police abolition and minimalism.

Introduction

Far-right extremism is on the rise in the United States.¹ Scholars agree that such ideologies are at odds with liberal democracy.² Indeed, far-right extremism is fueling a rise in political and racial violence—domestic terror attacks,³ anti-government militia groups,⁴ and misinformation. And, far-right extremism poses specific dangers to democracy and democratic institutions, as we all witnessed on January 6, 2021.

Typically, citizens and policymakers have looked to the institution of policing to offer protection from violence and threats posed by extremists.⁵ Unfortunately, policing cannot be consistently trusted to adequately protect us from far-right extremism and its attack on democracy, because, as I will show, many police have ignored, protected, or participated in the effort to undermine democracy.

As others have noted, the profession of policing holds special appeal for those who want to monitor and direct the comings and goings of people of color and non-citizens.⁶ Policing is one of the rare legal means by which those individuals can obtain specialized training, weapons, and the legal ability to use force, including deadly force, against others. As I argue here, policing itself can pose a threat to American democracy.

Of course, policing has always been an authoritarian institution in this country.⁷ Policing, and indeed the criminal legal system, relies on the loss of freedom, on violence, and on banishment in its operation.⁸ Nor is extremism something new to American policing.⁹

American laws, culture, and practices have trained most of us to ask police for help whenever there are threats to our physical safety. After the bombing of a federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995, police placement, surveillance, and protection of federal buildings increased.¹⁰ Similarly, after the September 11 attacks, police all over the country mobilized against this foreign terror threat.¹¹ America relies on policing to counter threats to our domestic security.¹² While the military is entrusted with securing us against foreign enemies, police typically are tasked with keeping us safe from domestic ones.¹³

A small but troubling number of police associate themselves with fringe far-right movements like the Oath Keepers, the Proud Boys, and the Constitutional Sheriffs.¹⁴ In this article, I will refer to this small group of police who participate in, aid, or sympathize with far-right groups and their beliefs as “extremist police.” These anti-government groups are dangerous and pose significant risks to individuals, political stability, and democracy itself. Moreover, some police officers who may not officially join these groups are sympathetic to and potentially supportive of their far-right principles.

This article explains how police undermine democracy when they deliberately share false information with the public. Some police don’t just participate in spin and propaganda about their performance, they also actively spread misinformation to control narratives about crime and who is dangerous.¹⁵ Propaganda, especially by government officials, threatens democracy because it limits the truthful information upon which voters can rely, and it undermines confidence in government institutions. Police propaganda can be destructive to democracy and extreme.

Some police attack democracy even more directly. A relatively small number of extremist police officers participate in far-right movements themselves. Dozens of law enforcement officers were at the Stop the Steal rally on January 6, 2021, and some officers have been convicted for their role in the riot that day.¹⁶ Hundreds of law enforcement officers have also been outed as belonging to far-right organizations, and even white supremacist groups.¹⁷ Some police officers meddle in elections and engage in voter intimidation.¹⁸ There have been instances of police officers who have taken voter machines, chanted while in uniform for their favored political candidate, and who have turned away from enforcing laws against armed militias’ voter intimidation at the polls.¹⁹

This article also highlights how several police institutions have decided not to enforce or abide by laws with which they disagree.²⁰ For example, police in several states have refused to enforce gun laws they do not like.²¹ Similarly, they ignore laws designed to guide their conduct.²² I will show how this practice effectively usurps power from voters and elected lawmakers, placing it in the hands of law enforcement. This extremist policing ignores the rule of law—an important part of democracy—and is a clear move towards a more authoritarian form of government.²³

Some might contend that the number of extremist police is relatively small and therefore they are not capable of significant systemic harm. But, minimizing this problem overlooks some core features of policing that make even a small number of extremist police potentially very powerful. The well-documented lack of accountability that police²⁴ enjoy relative to other public servants makes removing extremist police from their positions almost impossible. Moreover, given that law enforcement is racially uneven, with some neighborhoods getting no attention from police, while others see police activity every day,²⁵ extremist police are even more difficult to root out because police over-enforce laws against demographic groups who have little social capital compared to White individuals.

Much of the tension between democracy, national security, and law enforcement may reflect demographic differences between the American people and those who police them. White men are vastly overrepresented in American law enforcement, considering the diversity of the country.²⁶ There are significant differences in race, gender, sexual identity, and orientation. Even in the majority-minority states like California and Nevada,²⁷ police are still majority White.²⁸ Black officers are disappearing altogether from the field as the profession becomes less desirable to Black people.²⁹ In addition to the gender and racial differences, police tend to be more politically conservative than the people they are supposed to serve.³⁰ Police are thus different in a number of ways than those whom they are sworn to protect. These differences, as well as the surprisingly common acceptance of the “great replacement” theory,³¹ suggests that White men may see themselves as losing power in an increasingly diverse country, which prompts them to hold on fiercely to their political supremacy by using force and undermining democracy and its institutions.

Many Americans believe that police exist to enhance safety and have confidence in the institution of policing.³² But although police are public servants, they do not protect us all. Racial blind spots and conscious belief in the diminishing power of White people in America have allowed policing to be influenced by extreme and dangerous conspiracy theories. This, in turn, has compromised the security and the safety of America’s democratic institutions. The blind spots have also made policing even more dangerous.³³ As White people’s power and far-right movements grow in the United States, they grow within policing too.

As other scholars have suggested, American policing may have always existed, at least in some part, to diminish the democratic power of citizens of color,³⁴ but it no longer only seeks to diminish the power of racialized groups. Policing now also threatens to undermine democracy and democratic institutions more generally and is a particular threat to those who are critical of unfettered police power or who care about democracy.

As many academics, activists, and everyday citizens try to reimagine the institutions of our criminal legal system, understanding police as a threat to national security and democracy is an important, but under-considered factor in conversations around police abolition. In considering police abolition, scholars have pointed to racial bias,³⁵ violence,³⁶ impact on those with disabilities,³⁷ excessive force,³⁸ and lack of accountability as prevalent and problematic in policing. While I agree with those assessments, the threat to democracy is yet another critical consideration in assessing whether or not police contribute to safety.

In this Article, I will argue that specific issues with respect to law enforcement’s misinformation campaigns, anti-government and far-right extremism, and the failure to investigate the meddling in election integrity have not only compromised the safety and security of Americans but also undermined national security and even American democratic values and institutions. The article seeks to shed light on the dark aspects of policing. Extremism by police is not only dangerous to individual public safety, particularly the safety of people of color in this country, but it also poses risks to national security, public trust in government, and democracy. It may be that only a small number of police are currently involved in extremist policing, but given the power and discretion police wield, I will explain why this is an issue to which we should all pay close attention.

This Article will proceed in five parts. Part I is a short analysis of the role of police in democratic self-governance. In this section, I offer a definition of the term “extremist police” as used in this article. Part II describes the phenomenon of police officers’ personal involvement in far-right and anti-democratic groups. Part III describes law enforcement’s threat to elections. Part IV delves into police departments’ refusal to enforce laws they do not agree with. Part V includes several other ways that police undermine democracy, including attacks on a free press. The article concludes with an analysis of how democracy and national security might benefit from, if not police abolition, then a dramatic reframing and shrinking of police and safeguards against the institution’s power.

I. Democracy and the Role of Police

Many of the core features of America’s system of government are undemocratic and under attack.³⁹ In 2016, the United States was downgraded from a “full democracy” to a “flawed democracy” by The Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index.⁴⁰ In 2021, a Swedish think tank added the U.S. to a list of democracies in decline for the first time.⁴¹

The majority of threats to democracy in the United States come primarily from the far right.⁴² Many people generally consider police to be integral to democracy, as police are trusted to enforce the law.⁴³

Democracy is a form of government in which the people elect their representatives.⁴⁴ There are other hallmarks that most Americans think of as being essential to a functioning democracy—public accountability for their public servants, freedom of speech and press, freedom of assembly, individual freedom and rights of the individual being respected by their government, and the rule of law.⁴⁵ Yet American police undermine every aspect of these norms of democracy in ways that may not be understood by most.

For many, police are the “public face of the state.”⁴⁶ To the extent that police have a purpose in a democratic nation, their role is as the enforcer of the rule of law. When observed in communities, they serve as a visible reminder of the law. That said, police also have significant roles in other forms of government, including (and especially) dictatorial and autocratic ones.⁴⁷ In countries with those forms of government, police not only enforce the law, but also the dictatorial regime.⁴⁸ Police surveil the population to ascertain who the enemies of the state may be, they punish those in the opposition party, and they use violence to deter the population from resisting the authority of the government.⁴⁹

So, the rule of law in a true democracy must be distinct from pursuing political objectives, arbitrary punishment, or arbitrary law enforcement. Policing that is consistent with democracy is policing in which rules are applied fairly, and the people are treated with dignity by these powerful state actors.

Democracies depend on transparency of laws, due process for those accused of crimes, and an independent judiciary for their legitimacy. In a 2007 article, Ruling Out the Rule of Law, Professor Kim Forde-Mazrui explored the “inconsistency of unfettered police discretion with the rule of law” and argued that essential to the rule of law is a constraint on “the discretion exercised by those charged with” enforcing legal rules.⁵⁰

In a fully functioning democracy, the law would be enforced in a systematic, non-discriminatory way. In such an American utopia—one that this country has never enjoyed— communities of citizens of color would not be “socialized through interactions with the carceral state”⁵¹ while privileged other citizens live lives in which they are free from intrusions by these armed government actors. But, of course, police in the United States have tremendous discretion and are allowed and encouraged to use caprice in law enforcement. Indeed, our Supreme Court has approved arbitrary law enforcement since the 1990s.⁵² While this is a deeply concerning problem in policing and democracy, it is not the topic of this paper, as Forde-Mazrui covered this topic well years ago. This paper focuses on the myriads of other ways that extremist police undermine democracy, but I highlight this point, with which I agree, because the discretion police enjoy contributes to how well-hidden and protected from non-marginalized Americans the problem of extremist policing can be.

Likewise, as public servants in a well-functioning democracy, police would be held accountable to the community when they cross the line. An important value of liberal democracy is that government exists to serve the people, not the other way around.⁵³ Nor should the government serve only those in political power.

In a democracy, police who are not acting in the public interest should be easily fired when they act outside the law, but in the United States, it is often impossible to fire even seriously corrupt or violent police.⁵⁴ As one scholar put it, the “democratic ideal of policing is that law enforcement agencies should be accountable to the people they serve,” but police have shown “disregard for the rule of law.”⁵⁵ The lack of accountability for American police and the inconsistency of that phenomenon and democratic values is the central thesis of Barry Friedman and Maria Ponomarenko’s paper Democratic Policing.⁵⁶ This lack of accountability protects extremist police.

In her article Underenforcement, Alexandra Natapoff argued that the way in which law enforcement is over-deployed against certain demographic groups but under-deployed when these same people are victims of crimes are the “twin symptoms of a … democratic weakness of the criminal system.”⁵⁷

While this article will touch on issues relating to the under-enforcement of laws, the central focus will be on the ways police support the far right’s attacks on democracy. The under-enforcement I will focus on in this paper is that of laws inconsistent with right-wing ideologies. I will show how law enforcement officers’ defiance towards the law is both at odds with democracy and extremist.

Monica Bell pointed out how communities of color have been shaped by the criminal legal system’s involvement in their lives, mainly through policing, in a way that has caused alienation from the dominant culture.⁵⁸ This alienation has resulted in poor voter turnout, poor civic engagement, and feelings of dispossession.⁵⁹ This phenomenon is a critical part of the conversation around policing and democracy since the legal estrangement Bell describes compounds the issues of extremist policing.

The scholarship highlighted in this section provides a backdrop to the explicit focus of this article—extreme behavior by American police. Extremist police are police who 1) participate in far-right extremism, 2) interfere with elections, or 3) refuse to follow laws with which they do not agree. The following sections will lay out how extremist policing, in particular, threatens democracy beyond the general ways of alienation, focusing on communities of color and a lack of accountability. Law and culture in America have already accepted these aspects of American policing. The following sections will document the problems of extremist policing that threaten American democracy.

II. Law-enforcement and Far-Right Movements

Since January 6, 2021, it has become clearer that police fail to adequately protect Americans from threats from the far right. Police are sometimes active participants in far-right activities themselves. Indeed, some American police are complicit in the passive and active undermining of our national security from domestic terror threats. This section of the article will first lay out the threat posed to Americans by far-right extremism, then discuss the police’s participation and close association with those groups, how those views get transferred to other police, and police apathy and police blind spots to these dangerous groups.

America has been a witness to the far-right attacks on democracy in recent years. In addition to the January 6th attack in 2021 that targeted lawmakers and former Vice President Mike Pence, there was a 2020 plot to kidnap Michigan’s Democratic governor, Gretchen Whitmer.⁶⁰ Pipe bombs were sent to 16 of President Trump’s Democratic critics in 2019,⁶¹ and there was an assassination attempt on Donald Trump.⁶² There was an attack on the husband of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in 2022.⁶³ A 2023 anti-Semitic plot to kill a Democratic Attorney General in Michigan was thwarted.⁶⁴ Swatting attacks on judges and other public officials are also on the rise.⁶⁵ All of these attacks on political figures allegedly came from people who identify with right political ideologies.⁶⁶ The majority of the attacks on democracy in this country come from the political right.⁶⁷ Many people generally consider police to be integral to democracy as police are trusted to enforce the law.⁶⁸ That may not be wise.

A. Far-Right Extremism

The far-right refers to those with ideologies outside mainstream conservative politics. There are a number of divisions, and some overlap in far-right groups. Some far-right ideologies grow out of nationalism and include anti-immigrant, xenophobic, racist, and homophobic views. Although there are a number of other groups, with a number of different views—white nationalist, “alt-right”, anti-immigrant, anti-LGBT, anti-government militia groups—they do share some beliefs. Most far-right extremists believe that traditional European traditions are under attack. Generally, far-right groups believe white Americans are threatened in American demographics and politics.

Most anti-government groups are also part of the far-right.⁶⁹ These groups often purport that the government is tyrannical and dominated or controlled by leftist elites who will confiscate their guns, corrupt children, and otherwise undermine their freedom.⁷⁰ Some anti-government groups come out of the patriot movement and/or the sovereign citizen movements.⁷¹

In the United States, both of these far-right movements—the ones based in hatred of already marginalized people, and those based in hatred and/or mistrust of the federal government—are largely dominated by Whites.⁷² As this demographic group’s numbers fall⁷³ and its prominence and dominance over culture and politics recedes, far-right groups seek to increase their power and undermine the power of those that threaten their stake in American society. It is easy to see how both categories of far-right ideology are dangerous to a diverse America and how these ideologies may threaten political norms that no longer benefit them.⁷⁴

Far-right politics is growing in the United States. Indeed, a 2022 poll found that one-third of Americans believe in the Great Replacement Theory—the belief that people of color are being brought into the United States by powerful elites on the left to dwarf the political power of White Americans.⁷⁵ A different poll found that half of Americans and almost 70% of Republicans believe in this conspiracy theory.⁷⁶

Other polls also suggest that about ten percent of Americans identify with far-right values or find them “acceptable”. A 2017 poll found that ten percent of Americans thought neo-Nazi views aligned with theirs or were acceptable.⁷⁷ While a 2021 poll found that 12 percent of those polled had favorable views of the Capitol insurrectionists.⁷⁸

One in ten Americans considers themselves Christian Nationalists.⁷⁹ A majority of Christian Nationalists believe that a man should be the head of the family and that women should “submit to his leadership”.⁸⁰

If it is true that roughly ten percent of people identify with far-right ideologies, that means that there are tens of millions of Americans who hold those views. It also means that thousands of police officers identify with these extreme views.⁸¹ Given that there are over 700,000 police in the United States, there very well may be 70,000 police with extremist views.

The far-right has been fatal to many Americans and dangerous to its institutions. Many of the mass killings of people in this country have been racially or politically motivated.⁸² Home-grown terrorism by the far-right in the United States is a bigger threat to Americans than foreign terrorism.⁸³ Both the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the director of the Department of Homeland Security have taken this position.⁸⁴

Washington, DC, experienced this violence firsthand on January 6, 2021. Various far-right groups participated in the attack on the Capitol. Members of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, two powerful far-right groups, were involved in the violence at the Capitol.⁸⁵ Not only were many injured, but the attack also threatened democracy and democratic institutions as the central goal of the riot was to overturn the election of President Biden in favor of far-right President Donald Trump.⁸⁶ Between the media coverage that day, and the congressional hearings on the matter, America observed that overwhelmed police allowed the mob that attacked the Capitol to succeed. But what was harder to see on television was the role of the police in what took place that day.

B. Law Enforcement, Far-right Groups and Ideology

I have previously written about and documented police officers involved in racist hate groups and police who hold explicitly racist views.⁸⁷ Police officers have been found to be members of the League of the South, the KKK, and other white supremacist groups.⁸⁸ In the years since my article on this issue was published in 2019, many more high-profile and disturbing instances of explicit racial bias by police have taken place. A scandal within a California Bay Area police department revealed horrifically racist and violent texts in 2023 that more than 40 police officers sent and received.⁸⁹ An officer in Torrance, California spray painted a swastika on a car and the investigation into that revealed racist and anti-Semitic texts between a significant percentage of the police force there.⁹⁰ In North Carolina in 2020 white police officers were caught on their body-worn camera dreaming of a race war.⁹¹ A police officer in Mississippi was caught on tape bragging about the number of Black people he’d murdered during his career.⁹² A police officer in Michigan who had listed his home for sale had a framed KKK application in his home discovered by prospective buyers.⁹³ A police chief in Williamstown, MA had a framed photograph of Hitler inside his locker in the police house.⁹⁴ A police officer in San Jose, California who had previously texted another officer “I hate black people” shot a Black college football player who was helping diffuse a fight and had done nothing wrong.⁹⁵

In addition to my research, others have written about the troubling phenomenon of extremism in law enforcement.⁹⁶ Anne Speckhard and Molly Ellenberg argue, among other things, that law enforcement perceives violent extremists as “non-threatening allies.”⁹⁷

Department of Justice reports on policing in Chicago⁹⁸, Ferguson⁹⁹, Louisville¹⁰⁰ made clear that the use of racial slurs by police officers was tolerated for years in those cities.¹⁰¹ The Plain View Project has outed thousands of instances of police officers expressing racial bias, but also homophobia, transphobia, and Islamophobia, and other hate towards the people they are supposed to protect and serve.¹⁰² The explicit racial bias is certainly a feature of American policing.

In addition to exhibiting explicit racial bias, some police officers have affiliated themselves with other far-right extremist groups, like the Proud Boys¹⁰³, and antigovernment militia groups like the Oath Keepers¹⁰⁴ and Three Percenters¹⁰⁵. In the appendices, I have documented dozens of instances of police officers in these anti-government groups.¹⁰⁶ For example, 27 current and former Chicago police officers were on a leaked list of Oath Keepers; similarly the sheriff of Riverside, CA, was a dues-paying member of the Oath Keepers.¹⁰⁷ In leaked data from 2022, 370 police and sheriffs were outed as active members of the Oath Keepers.¹⁰⁸ For example, dozens of police in one department in Oregon joined the Oath Keepers.¹⁰⁹ They helped oppose a measure to ban assault weapons in the state.¹¹⁰ These are simply the stories reported in the press, there are likely many more officers engaged in this type of activity but who are unknown to the public.¹¹¹

Many of these officers have been exposed to the public by individuals, through anti-fascist groups, or reporters rather than exposed by other police officers or their departments. This points to yet another law enforcement failure within their departments. The inability of departments to root out officers with troubling beliefs and backgrounds shows a lack of intelligence-gathering ability by police or a tolerance for the mindset.

The Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association is another far-right, anti-government organization.¹¹² But this group, whose ideology is based on the sovereign citizen movement and the patriot movement, is made up exclusively of law enforcement officers. The sovereign citizen movement has been deemed an extremist group by the FBI.¹¹³

These elected local law enforcement officers believe they are the highest legal authority in the country, above even the President of the United States and the courts, and answer to no one.¹¹⁴ They believe their power to decide constitutional questions is higher than anyone else’s power.¹¹⁵ Their position of trust, authority, and ability to use force could, and in some instances has, become a significant problem when they oppose the policies of those elected to power. There are quite literally hundreds of sheriffs who are part of this extremist movement, who operate under a serious misunderstanding of the law and who do not respect the power of the federal government.¹¹⁶ They use their position to decide which laws to enforce, rather than following the lead of the legislature. Scholars Emily Farris and Mirya Holman have written about how the Constitutional Sheriffs’ belief system, which centers on their interpretation of the Constitution, trumps anyone else’s. They refer to this as “anti-federalism”.¹¹⁷ They also argue that these sheriffs’ far-right attitudes “represent a core threat to the functioning of federalism in the United States”¹¹⁸

The Proud Boys are a neo-fascist, anti-immigrant, and misogynistic group.¹¹⁹ The group’s profile was raised when then President Trump mentioned the group, instructing “Proud Boys, Stand [sic] back and stand by.” Dozens of police officers have been identified as members of or friendly with the Proud Boys.¹²⁰ In addition to officers within the Proud Boys and who have ties to the groups, a D.C. police lieutenant who worked in the Intelligence Division of the Metropolitan Police Department in Washington, DC was discovered to have “frequently provided Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio with internal information” and even warned him of an arrest warrant he suspected was being issued.¹²¹

A police officer in Akron, Ohio, had a tattoo that appeared to be from the Three Percenters, but he denied membership in the group, and the department kept him on the force.¹²² So did one in South Bend, Indiana—he retired.¹²³ A uniformed Chicago police officer was seen wearing a face mask bearing the Three Percenters’ logo while monitoring a racial justice protest.¹²⁴ A South Carolina police officer’s car was observed with a Three Percenters sticker on it.¹²⁵ And, a police officer in St. Louis, Missouri, flew a Three Percenters flag outside his home, even after January 6th.¹²⁶

The Three Percenters, Proud Boys, and Oath Keepers are dangerous groups; they played a significant role in the January 6th attack on the Capitol and democracy in their efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election. Six Oath Keepers were convicted of seditious conspiracy,¹²⁷ and others were convicted of lower-level charges related to January 6th.¹²⁸ Four Proud Boys were convicted of seditious conspiracy, and one member was convicted of a lesser charge.¹²⁹ Members of the Three Percenters also took part in the January 6th insurrection.¹³⁰

Dozens of current and former police officers were present at the rally on January 6th, and some participated in the riot at the Capitol on the same day.¹³¹ Two police officers have been convicted for their role in the capitol siege.¹³² More retired police were there, and some even participated or are alleged to have participated in the breach while Congress was meant to be certifying the 2020 election.¹³³

At least 47 active police officers attended the rally but were not involved in the breach of the Capitol.¹³⁴ The behavior and thought processes of those officers are worrying. Attending the rally would be attractive in two scenarios. One would have to have believed that the election had been stolen or wanted to undo the election results of a popularly elected president, a direct subversion of democracy, in order to have attended the rally. For law enforcement officers who simply fell for the false narrative that Donald Trump had won the presidency a second time, there are serious concerns about their ability to separate fact from fiction. One would hope that police, who must evaluate intelligence and public tips, would know how to assess the reliability of the information they receive. After all, police assessments of the reliability of witnesses and information is one of the basic ways that courts decide whether there exists probable cause for an arrest.¹³⁵ For law enforcement officers who understood that the election had not been stolen by President Biden, but still hoped to install Trump as president, even if they did not resort to violence, should be assessed for someone whose job it is to enforce laws. Overall, the fact that there were dozens of active and retired police officers at the “Stop the Steal” rally is troubling for democracy and for policing.

In addition to police participation on January 6th, law enforcement had a role in the Unite the Right rally. A police officer from Massachusetts is alleged to have organized the 2017 Unite the Right rally.¹³⁶ The purpose of this multi-day event was, as its title suggests, to unite far-right groups.¹³⁷ During the rally, participants chanted racist and anti-Semitic slogans, and many were armed.¹³⁸ Scores were hurt, and one person was killed.¹³⁹ Critiques of the Virginia State Police and Charlottesville police officers who were policing the march point out that police allowed these racist groups to perpetuate violence against the civilian crowd.¹⁴⁰ As politics continue to remain polarized, it is hard to know how much more havoc these groups, and the police associated with them, may cause.

Police officers have been known to support and spread far-right conspiracy theories.¹⁴¹ The QAnon conspiracy imagines liberals as child-killers, Q, an anonymous member of the federal government, ready to expose these murderous politicians.¹⁴² Like those in attendance at the “Stop the Steal” rally and other police officers who believed that the 2020 election was stolen, lack critical thinking skills, the ability to adequately assess information, and spend a significant amount of time on troubling right-wing online sources.

The “Great Replacement Theory” has been attractive to law enforcement. A Border Patrol agent and the president of the National Border Patrol Council gave an interview with Fox News in which he parroted the Great Replacement Theory.¹⁴³ This racist and xenophobic false conspiracy theory is the same as the one that animated and inspired the shooters in Buffalo and El Paso.¹⁴⁴ A person charged with guarding our border with Mexico spreading a conspiracy theory that the Biden administration and other left elites that are purposely replacing Whites by the immigration of people of color undoubtedly gave credibility to the conspiracy. If he believes in this white nationalist conspiracy theory, he lacks the critical thinking skills and threat assessment skills just like QAnon-believing police and The Big Steal-believing police officers.

To achieve their goals in an increasingly diverse America, far-right groups seek to lessen the political power of people of color and those not ideologically aligned with them.¹⁴⁵ In order to accomplish this, law enforcement officers are also targeted for recruitment by these far-right groups as well.¹⁴⁶ Police can use force against other Americans, get specialized training, and have access to sensitive information that can be used by these far-right groups, so they are attractive to the far-right groups that want to know if law enforcement are monitoring them and that want to use violence.¹⁴⁷ In addition to being targeted by these groups, a person who already had a white supremacist or other far-right inclination to subordinate others would be attracted to law enforcement for similar reasons.¹⁴⁸ The power, training, and access to information available to law enforcement make it wonderfully appealing to those in the far-right.¹⁴⁹

We have seen the impact of some far-right groups on American stability, democracy, and national security since January 6, 2021. Yet, we know that thousands of American police officers are attracted to these violent far-right groups and their ideologies.

C. Reach of Extreme Police Views

The reach of police with far-right ties extends beyond individual officers and even their immediate departments. Some law enforcement officers are active on social media.¹⁵⁰ They post their views, which friends, family, and acquaintances can see and be influenced by those messages. The influence on other officers is hard to quantify. If an officer is partnered with, attends trainings with, or sits in court with officers, they can be exposed to their political views through conversation while in those shared experiences. Other officers with extremist views are recruiters and trainers, who expose hundreds of police to their extreme views.¹⁵¹

Madalyn Wasilczuk has pointed out that police are often young and impressionable when they are hired.¹⁵² She argues that society should be concerned about youthful police officers, given that research on adolescent brain development has shown that people under 30 are more likely to fall prey to peer pressure and to act impulsively.¹⁵³ When one considers that new recruits often fall in that age group,¹⁵⁴ the political, racial, and other world views of partners, superior officers, recruiters, and trainers may leave those young officers with a certain view of what police officers are supposed to believe. Then those younger officers will share what they have learned with their cohort and those behind them, normalizing these world-views.

Some police officers lie under oath because of the “‘blue wall of silence,’ an unwritten code in many departments which prohibits disclosing perjury or other misconduct by fellow officers, or even testifying truthfully if the facts would implicate the conduct of a fellow officer.”¹⁵⁵ It follows that a few of these officers who hold far-right views will be reported. Thus, many more officers hold these views than this article would suggest. Most will remain on the force because they will not be outed by other officers. The lack of accountability for police that Barry Friedman and Maria Ponomarenko discuss in Democratic Policing¹⁵⁶, means that it is hardly worth bothering to report officers who are doing or saying extreme things because they will likely remain on the force.

There are few consequences for those who may be sympathetic to the far right but are not members of the organizations that commit crimes, spread terror and promote violence. Simply holding the views of these groups without membership in the group means that there is nothing illegal about having disturbing far-right views. The First Amendment protects police officers who hold these views, unless they are shared publicly and could undermine the relationship between the police department and the community.¹⁵⁷

Considering the danger posed by the police involved in far-right extremism, the unknown reach and influence they have in police departments, and incredible power police possess, and the difficulty in exposing and identifying police who old these views, the existence of far-right police is a good reason to simply reduce the number of police officers in the United States and limit their interactions with civilians.

D. Law Enforcement’s Blind Spot?

While this paper has examined the problems with direct police involvement in far-right activity, there is also a significant indirect danger to the public when police are complacent about far-right extremism, even when the police are not directly involved. It appears that with respect to the significant danger of far-right terrorism, law enforcement suffers a significant blind spot.

Despite the political instability, chaos, and violence of January 6th, for well over a year, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the principal federal law enforcement agency, refused to investigate President Donald Trump’s role in attempts to undo the 2020 presidential election results.¹⁵⁸ Similarly, FBI agents resisted searching President Trump related to his taking of top-secret national security and nuclear capability documents, despite ample proof that he had done so.¹⁵⁹ Whether trying to protect the Trump’s far-right administration, or trying to avoid seeming political, or out of a fear of powerful people, law enforcement’s failure to take action, even in the face of one of the nation’s largest attacks on democracy in our lives to take action is more than disheartening. While the 2024 Supreme Court’s ruling on presidential immunity makes this case appear to be less viable,¹⁶⁰ There was little concern about presidential immunity at the time that the FBI and the DOJ should have been mulling over charges in 2021 and 2022. The failure to investigate President Trump immediately after January 6, 2021, is yet another example of how little law enforcement contributes to our safety and security, and how damaging it can be to democracy.

Warnings about far-right extremism have been known to law enforcement for years before January 6th. Before January 6th’s violence, the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville had just taken place in 2017. Anti-mask and anti-vaccine protests in 2020 and later were also led by people on the far-right.¹⁶¹ Conflicts with armed militia at Black Lives Matter protests in the summer of 2020 after the murder of George Floyd and then later that year at voting locations were yet another warning about the perils and chaos created by the far right.¹⁶² Yet despite this information and intelligence on the issue, police failed to adequately anticipate the Capitol Siege on January 6, 2021.¹⁶³

Nor did the shootings by white supremacists at a church in Georgia in 2017, at a Texas Walmart in 2018, or at a Pittsburgh synagogue in 2019 seem to be adequate to keep the Buffalo shooting from taking place in 2022. Of course, far-right violence should have been on law enforcement’s radar since the Oklahoma City bombing¹⁶⁴ and the violence in Waco¹⁶⁵ in the mid 1990s. While law enforcement cannot be expected to thwart every attack, far-right terror has been on the rise in the United States; yet, policing continues to focus on many non-violent offenses like trespass, shoplifting, and drug possession.¹⁶⁶

But low-level offenses are not the only focus of American law enforcement. Rather than focusing on the threats from the far-right, the FBI spent time investigating antifa and “Muslim men as targets in government-led sting operations.”¹⁶⁷ Was this because police saw antifa as critical of them? Was it because law enforcement’s views were more politically in line with the right than the left? Or was it because they were unable to conceive of the largely white far-right extremists as dangerous? The answer to these questions is yes. This type of policing and these policing blind spots demonstrate an inability to correctly assess dangers from the right and keep Americans and their institutions safe. Far-right groups pose real threats not just to marginalized groups and democracy, but also to law enforcement. During the January 6th Capitol Siege, for example, about 140 police officers were injured.¹⁶⁸ In 2020, a man connected with the Boogaloo Bois, an anti-government extremist group, shot numerous rounds of ammunition at a police department in Minnesota.¹⁶⁹ A different man, also associated with the Boogaloo Bois, killed a federal officer in California.¹⁷⁰ Scholars have written about the threat posed to police by the far right’s infiltration of law enforcement, particularly by anti-government groups.¹⁷¹ Unfortunately, police departments across the country have for too long underestimated the threat posed by far-right extremists not just to our communities but also to law enforcement.

Extremism scholars Parkin, Mills, and Gruenewald wrote in a 2021 piece, published after January 6^th, that some police officers have “become victims of far-right extremism, while other law enforcement officers have engaged in actions that may seem to signal tacit support” for the same.¹⁷² They conclude that police are suffering from both internal and external threats from the far-right.¹⁷³

Perhaps this contradictory position police find themselves in can be explained in part by the demographics of American police forces. White men are overrepresented in police departments nationwide. Simultaneously, white men are most likely to associate themselves with far-right ideologies in America.¹⁷⁴ Partisan politics seem to be increasing within law enforcement.¹⁷⁵ Political donations by police have increased and are overwhelmingly in support of Republicans.¹⁷⁶

Some have argued that the culture of policing also encourages a lack of accountability in what they may see as any pursuit of their goals. Scholars have written about the shift from a police identity as guardians to one as warriors.¹⁷⁷ The warrior mentality fosters an “us against them” mentality, which may normalize and protect extremism in police ranks. One scholar explained, “the Warrior concept promotes an adversarial style of policing that estranges the public and contributes to unnecessary conflict and violence.”¹⁷⁸ If we assume that extremist police (and perhaps other officers) feel as if they are warriors against a group that they are sworn to protect, this exemplifies how policing undermines democracy. Government is supposed to serve the people, so public servants who see themselves as at war with that public are at odds with democracy.

Policing scholar Jerome Skolnick wrote in his book Justice Without Trial: Law Enforcement in Democratic Society that “police see themselves, by and large, as a distinct and often deprived group in our society.”¹⁷⁹ He suggests that this shared view among officers creates a “magnified sense of group solidarity.”¹⁸⁰ If true, this likely solidifies the “us against them” mentality in many officers and entrenches the Blue Wall of Silence that undermines police accountability.

These views of themselves, along with intelligence blind spots and the inability to rationally appreciate threats to our safety, undermine both democracy and national security.

E. Violence by Police Towards Those That Threaten Them

In addition to blind spots, police and their representatives often shut down the voices of anyone critical of them. But expressing dissenting views critical of government is a core hallmark of democracy. It is one that is threatened and punished by the police in many instances.

The summer of 2020 saw a significant, forceful police response to the Black Lives Matter movement—a movement born out of critiques of police and their attitudes toward Black people. The police were harsh against these protestors.¹⁸¹ Indeed, data shows that police are three times more likely to use force against leftwing protestors than against right-wing protestors.¹⁸² Some police even took to social media to threaten those who protested.¹⁸³ Around the same time, there were protests around mask mandates imposed because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the police responded much less violently to those protests.¹⁸⁴

There are other instances of police harassing those critical of them. For example, The Washington Post detailed the harassment and arrest of a civil rights attorney in Mississippi who was encouraging the Department of Justice to investigate the Lexington Police Department.¹⁸⁵ Police officers have also been uncooperative with progressive prosecutors who want to hold police officers accountable for misbehavior.¹⁸⁶

Policing scholar Seth Stoughton has described how the warrior culture of police resists criticism, especially from people outside their profession.¹⁸⁷ Police who do not just resist fair critique of their work as public servants, but retaliate against them because they are critical, are extremists and are dangerous to democratic norms around the rule of law.

III. Policing & Voting

Police also interfere with democracy when they interfere with enfranchisement. Voting for representatives is the hallmark of democracy around the world, but police in the United States interfere with voting in various ways.

Before addressing the ways that extremist police interfere with elections, it is necessary to acknowledge that the most identifiable and obvious way that police interfere with democracy is by over- policing certain communities. This creates feelings of alienation towards government¹⁸⁸ and socializes people in a way that is inconsistent with democracy.¹⁸⁹

Monica Bell has called the result of this type of policing on the communities subjected to it “legal estrangement” in her groundbreaking article Police Reform and the Dismantling of Legal Estrangement In addition, the estrangement may cause people to abandon voting, as they may not feel like full citizens.¹⁹⁰ Others may not vote because they have been saddled with criminal convictions, which can cause them to lose the right to vote in many states.¹⁹¹ But this type of voter depression at the hands of police does not fall in the category of extremist policing because it is the norm in so many urban and rural communities of color.¹⁹²

Police have at times turned a blind eye to the serious crime of voter intimidation when it aligns with their political views. Voting advocates had to go to court to rid Arizona voter drop boxes of the armed militia members, as police did not stop them from approaching voters attempting to cast their ballots.¹⁹³ Some law enforcement officers have even participated in voter intimidation themselves.¹⁹⁴

In addition to members of militia groups discouraging voters, armed Sheriffs in Pennsylvania “guarded” voting boxes, a tactic known to lower voter participation amongst people of color.¹⁹⁵ These sheriffs questioned voters at an early voting site about whether the ballots they were dropping off were really theirs.¹⁹⁶ Other law enforcement officials have spread misinformation about election integrity.¹⁹⁷ This behavior is right out of Donald Trump’s playbook. On Sean Hannity’s show just before the 2020 election, then-President Donald Trump promised that there would be sheriffs at polling places due to the voter fraud that Trump alleged would take place.¹⁹⁸

Protect America Now¹⁹⁹—a group of American Sheriffs, spread disinformation about the 2020 election and pushed the Republican partisan agenda.²⁰⁰ The four tenets of Protect America Now were: law and order, pro-gun, anti-immigrant, and anti-tax.²⁰¹ The focus on a law enforcement-led organization featuring a uniformed sheriff could easily have a chilling effect on democratic norms. While the anti-immigration focus of Protect America Now is not typically in the purview of local sheriffs, but instead federal agencies, it could be perceived as giving a law enforcement stamp of approval against migrants.

While the sheriffs in Protect America Now used indirect misinformation, a Sheriff in Michigan made a more direct choice. He simply took a vote tabulator, allegedly to investigate what he claimed to be voter fraud.²⁰² When it was returned, its security seal had been broken.²⁰³ Still employed months later, he then spoke at a conference, asking that the machine be returned to him.²⁰⁴

In New York, some police officers tried to influence votes. Uniformed NYPD officers chanted, over a megaphone, “Trump 2020” on the first day of early voting there during the 2020 presidential election cycle.²⁰⁵ Police officers are not supposed to express political views while in uniform or on duty.²⁰⁶ Most states, including New York, also ban campaigning near election sites.²⁰⁷

Politics was also clearly very much the plan when the New York City Police Benevolent Association, a union representing 24,000 NYPD officers, broke with its own tradition of not endorsing political candidates for President when it endorsed then-President Trump’s re-election campaign in 2020.²⁰⁸ The National Fraternal Order of Police, which represents more than 300,000 police officers²⁰⁹, also endorsed Trump for president in 2020.²¹⁰

In addition to their direct action with respect to attaining votes for their favored candidates during election season, police have failed to adequately take threats to poll workers seriously. A 2021 Reuters investigation found that although there were more than 100 reported threats to volunteers monitoring voting in 2020, police made only four arrests for this criminal activity and no convictions resulted.²¹¹ As a result of the difficulties faced by poll workers after the 2020 election, America faced a poll worker shortage during the mid-term elections in 2022.²¹²

A lawsuit alleges that police in a North Carolina town used pepper spray to break up a peaceful get-out-the-vote rally.²¹³ Citizens were on their way to a polling location when police used the powerful dispersal weapon against citizens who had broken no laws.²¹⁴

The handful of police officers who try to influence votes for their favored candidate, brazenly intimidate citizens, or fail to take voter intimidation seriously just because it is directed at those at the opposite end of the political spectrum undermines the power of the people to direct their government. Armed, uniformed agents of the state involved in election meddling is a blow to free and fair elections. It is evidence of the stark political differences between the electorate and those who police them. It is dangerous, and while only a few police are implicated, any voter meddling by government actors is serious. Police undermining the public’s power is a threat to democracy and one more reason to shrink policing in this country.

IV. Law Enforcement’s Enforcement of Law

In addition to attacks on elections and participation in far-right extremist politics, police can undermine democracy by their refusal to follow the law. As Alexandra Natapoff pointed out in a 2006 article, the same police can simultaneously over-enforce and under-enforce the law, thereby contributing to the erosion of democracy and democratic values.²¹⁵ In Natapoff’s paper, she highlights police underenforcement of laws where marginalized people are victimized, while at the same time over-enforcing laws against those same groups.²¹⁶

For the purpose of this article, I focus on two ways in which police underenforce the law. At times, police refuse to enforce existing laws against others with whom they disagree. In other instances, law enforcement fails to follow laws designed to guide their own conduct. Both are undemocratic.

A. Laws Against Others

Police in some jurisdictions have refused to enforce laws enacted by popularly elected legislators and voters. In Washington state²¹⁷, Colorado²¹⁸, Maryland²¹⁹, Illinois²²⁰, and New York²²¹, sheriffs have refused to enforce gun control measures with which they did not agree. In Washington state alone, 20 sheriffs announced they would not enforce new gun laws there.²²² 80 sheriffs in Illinois were opposed to laws limiting the sale of assault weapons and high-capacity magazine.²²³ These law enforcement officers have stated publicly that they will not be enforcing the law.²²⁴ The chiefs who dictate to the other officers not to enforce laws are extremist police. Public proclamations by law enforcement about the enforcement of gun laws could encourage people to break the law and acquire new guns or keep the newly forbidden ones because they will not face arrest.²²⁵ Because police are the armed enforcers of the law, there is little to be done by those who want the laws enforced when law enforcement will not do the job.

Although armed militias appeared at racial justice protests in 2020, masking rallies, and at polls during elections, they run afoul of statutes on the books in many states when these private groups try to enforce public laws. However, police rarely arrested them.²²⁶ There are laws in all 50 states outlawing armed militia.²²⁷ Most active militias in the United States have far-right politics.²²⁸ The idea behind laws that outlaw these vigilante law-enforcement groups is that we do not want people without legal and safety training to arm themselves and put on uniforms to “enforce laws.” Kyle Rittenhouse, the teen who killed a young man at a protest and shot several others called himself a “minuteman,” and was associated with Boogaloo Bois militia, a far-right militia.²²⁹ The Second Amendment protects a “well-regulated militia,” meaning regulated by the government, not groups of private civilians with political agendas. But enforcement of these measures has been nonexistent, with police officers being the only entity entrusted with law enforcement.²³⁰

Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, 2020 and 2021 saw widespread mask mandates in public places. But those years also marked a rejection of ordinances requiring masks or COVID-19 vaccines for law enforcement.²³¹ Police refused to enforce those laws with respect to the general public and with respect to themselves.²³² It is certainly possible that law enforcement being dubious of these health measures contributed to the general rejection of these prophylactic public health policies by those on the right.

Police have tremendous discretion, but when they categorically refuse to enforce laws that citizens or their representatives voted for and for which there was public comment and input, they are at odds with a society that is governed by its people. It is also at odds with their role as our public servants to simply ignore laws on the books because they disagree with them.

B. Abiding by the Law as Law Enforcement

But it is not just that police fail to enforce laws they do not agree with against others; some police officers also flout the law themselves. In her article Scofflaw Law Enforcement, Rachel Moran details many examples of police officers who refuse to follow laws designed to guide their own behavior. She divides the motivations behind this lawless behavior into five categories: convenience, ends justify the means, self-protection, political values, and contempt for life.²³³ But given the policing role of enforcer of the rule of law, any intentional law enforcement law violation can be considered extreme and outside acceptable ideas around policing.

For example, police in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, decided not to follow a law designed to limit police interactions with the public in an effort to reduce police violence. There, police decided to resume traffic stops for minor infractions, even though a city ordinance prohibits them from doing so.²³⁴ The ordinance, modeled after a similar law in Philadelphia, was meant to address racial disparities in policing.²³⁵ 42% of those stopped by police in Pittsburgh were Black although Black people make up 22% of the population.²³⁶ Nevertheless, the extremist police chief decided that police morale trumped the will of lawmakers and those who voted for them.²³⁷ It is obvious to see how the failure to follow a law enacted to protect citizens from police discrimination, power, and abuse, is deeply undemocratic.

Police are also known to lie under oath and in police reports. The phenomenon is so well-known that there have been commissions on the matter.²³⁸ The phenomenon is so common that there is even a name for it—testilying.²³⁹ But police are rarely charged with perjury by their brethren, even when other officers know about their untruths.²⁴⁰

Demographic differences between law enforcement and the general public may again help explain why they disagree with the laws. The rest of America is much more diverse racially, with respect to age, sexual orientation, and gender, than the American police.²⁴¹ With respect to gun control, for example, the vast majority of Americans support gun control.²⁴² And police may not live in the more diverse and progressive cities that pass these laws, choosing to live in whiter, less diverse areas.²⁴³

These differences are even more stark when it comes to sheriffs.²⁴⁴ Even in majority minority states like California and Nevada, more than 90% of sheriffs are White.²⁴⁵ Washington state has no sheriffs of color, even though the state is 30% non-White.²⁴⁶ Sixteen states have no women sheriffs at all.²⁴⁷

Most laws that police enforce are enacted by legislators elected by the community. While some sheriffs are elected, they are elected to enforce laws, not create them. When any law enforcement officer fails to follow democratically enacted laws, they take power away from the people. Law enforcement is largely male and disproportionately white. Their positions on gun control and other political hot topics may differ from those of the general public. Refusing to follow laws with which they do not agree is patriarchal and reinforces white supremacy, in addition to being undemocratic.

V. Other Undemocratic Efforts by Police

Police and their representatives take aim at democracy in other ways. This section will explore other attacks on democracy and national security that do not fit neatly in the previous categories.

A. Misinformation and Influence

Public trust in government is fundamental to any democratic nation. Misinformation can be dangerous, especially when it comes from government agents. Government propaganda is a hallmark of authoritarian regimes.²⁴⁸ Misinformation can ultimately undermine democracy because citizens feel they cannot trust the word of their government. But misinformation is a feature of American policing in a number of instances.

In its most benign form, police departments and their representatives, such as police unions, can present statistics in subjective ways to make it appear they are doing a better job of solving or deterring crime.²⁴⁹ Law enforcement agencies also manipulate information about police violence and complaints about their performance.²⁵⁰ This allows police to appear that they are doing a better job at keeping people safe from crime than is actually true. This helps with public perception of police and ultimately means that they get more power and financial resources.

However, sometimes police misinformation can be even more sinister, political, and extreme than just trying to show they are doing a good job. One of the most egregious examples of this misinformation campaign by law enforcement is that in 2020, during the Trump administration, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) manufactured stories about left-wing domestic terrorists to help get then-President Trump re-elected.²⁵¹ DHS is a federal law enforcement agency focused on public security and founded after the terrorist attack on September 11, 2001.²⁵² DHS officials manufactured dossiers on ordinary individuals protesting police bias, some of whom were not even arrested for any crime. Dossiers were created not only for protestors but also for journalists, who were critical of their tactics at protests.²⁵³ At the same time DHS overplayed the danger from Black Lives Matter protestors and antifa.

Law enforcement using its power for the intimidation of citizens and journalists exercising their First Amendment rights is alarming, to say the least, in a healthy democracy. DHS falsely tried to link those individuals for whom they created dossiers relating to a non-existent left wing terrorism movement.

This is not the only time that DHS is alleged to have purposely spread misinformation. A whistleblower from inside the agency has also accused leadership there of deliberately downplaying the threats posed by Russia and white supremacist groups once again in an attempt to benefit the Trump administration, which was friendly and linked with both Russia and far-right groups.²⁵⁴

These false narratives, given legitimacy by the federal agents who participated in concocting them, were an attack on American democracy. The general public was misled by DHS into being afraid of left-wing radicals that did not exist, and yet were not alerted to be on guard for the real threats posed by the far-right white supremacists. Not only was this plot dangerous, misleading, and corrupt, but it also undermined the legitimacy of our electoral and criminal legal systems. These ploys by the DHS are not the only attempts by law enforcement to undermine democratic norms. Police are supposed to be public servants who protect everyone in this country. Federal officials are not supposed to take political positions, much less use their positions to impact the outcome of an election. No law enforcement agency is supposed to serve the interests of a single political figure.

The misinformation campaign by DHS minimized threats from white supremacist groups. While downplaying the threat from white supremacist groups, DHS and other federal law enforcement agencies failed to stop white supremacist attacks on Black shoppers in 2022 in Buffalo²⁵⁵, Jewish people worshipping at their synagogue in Pittsburgh, PA ²⁵⁶, or Latinos at a Walmart in El Paso, TX²⁵⁷. Police have done little to thwart this type of domestic terrorism and law enforcement left marginalized people in the dark about reals threats. Targeting the marginalized is a hallmark of white supremacists, fascists, and other far-right groups and DHS enabled those groups by downplaying the threat they pose.

Ultimately, the false information spread by police undermines democracy and public trust in government. Delivered by heavily armed people who are authorized to use force against others, messages from police are more chilling than those from a private citizen or even other public servants like librarians or teachers. Political messages, propaganda, and misinformation by police to attempt to sway or undermine an election is a good reason to lose trust in the institution of policing.

B. Policing Lobby

In the article “Police-Made Law,” Brenner Fissell explores how police chiefs have sponsored local legislation to expand police authority to make arrests.²⁵⁸ Examples given in the piece involved misdemeanor offenses not already in the criminal code, such as public intoxication, homelessness-related ordinances, and noise ordinances.²⁵⁹ Lawmaking is outside of the traditional role of police. The police function is usually conceived of as simple law enforcement. Unlike elected legislators, police have an advocacy role and pursuing new criminal offenses to enlarge their power while reducing the civil liberties of the people in their town or city is worrisome. But as Fissell puts it, police are “expanding the footprint of the racialized misdemeanor system while also increasing the scope of their own power.”²⁶⁰ Police expanding their own power in this way is hazardous to democracy.

In 2023, after Washington, DC’s City Council voted to lower penalties for some crimes, the DC police union urged the mayor to veto the legislation.²⁶¹ When the council overrode the veto, the union became involved in efforts for Congress to interfere with the city’s autonomy as a city without a state directly attacking the representation of hundreds of thousands of people.²⁶²

Similarly, after a white man was arrested by police after killing a Black unhoused man on a MTA subway, the national police association attacked democratically elected Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg for the prosecution, undermining the rule of law.²⁶³ This union appeared on far-right news platform Newsmax.²⁶⁴ They also take a very anti-immigration position, even when it does not concern local law enforcement.²⁶⁵

Police unions also call for more due process for their officers facing discipline when they violate the law or policy, but at the same time complain about due process protections for everyday citizens.²⁶⁶ This is another way that police undermine democratic norms and consistency in the application of law.

Not unlike their role in developing new criminal offenses, police unions have played a role in undermining democratically elected progressive prosecutors with whom they disagree.²⁶⁷ One might think that shrinking the role of police so that they no longer have to respond to crimes of desperation or mental health crises, as some progressive prosecutors have urged, might be welcome news to law enforcement and their representatives. But police in Minnesota, Texas, and Pennsylvania have campaigned against prosecutors who have run on police accountability platforms or after attempts to hold police to account for excessive force by prosecuting officers in their departments.²⁶⁸

Skolnick has made the point that “lobbying, campaigning, and the like tend to make the policing function itself appear politically motivated.”²⁶⁹ The same is likely true for police unions and other police proxy groups when they engage in political campaigning and lobbying.

C. Perks for friends

American police are not just taking aim at their political enemies but also undermining democracy by giving preferential treatment to their friends. Police unions extend cards to their friends and relatives as a way of showing other officers, should the loved one run afoul of the law, that they have close ties to law enforcement.²⁷⁰ These cards are commonly known as “get out of jail free card” and are seen as a way to avoid traffic tickets issued by police officers. In using these cards, the user hopes the officer will exercise his discretion and not issue a ticket.²⁷¹ But, of course, this privilege is available only to the bearer of the ticket and not the wider community.²⁷² With people of color more likely to be underrepresented in law enforcement, whites are most likely to be the beneficiaries of these cards as white police are more likely to have friends and family who are also white²⁷³ so these cards reinforce racist traffic enforcement. The cards undermine public safety as the holder of the card holds a belief that they will not be issued a ticket, so they have less incentive to drive carefully. The cards are also another way police erode the rule of law and the democratic norms that everyone is treated equally under it.

D. Police & the Press

Finally, some police have purposefully targeted journalists. Of course, a free press is essential to a democracy²⁷⁴—without it, the public does not have access to information about the behavior of its government and receives only the propaganda created by that government. A free press is a hallmark of a democratic country.²⁷⁵

Nevertheless, police repeatedly arrest journalists doing their jobs.²⁷⁶ For example, Minnesota state police arrested a CNN news team that included an anchor while they were reporting the George Floyd protests. live.²⁷⁷The journalists have faced not only loss of liberty for performing their jobs protected by the First Amendment, but have also been subjected to physical assault, such as pepper spray and strikes from batons.²⁷⁸

DHS not only created dossiers on protestors but also compiled intelligence reports on journalists covering protests critical of the police.²⁷⁹. Hostility to the press may have filtered down to police from far-right president Trump, who referred to the press as “bad people” and “enemy of the people”.²⁸⁰ Despite the fact that this type of behavior may be approved by former President Trump this behavior does not make it any less of a threat to democracy.

The Press Freedom Tracker is a nonpartisan organization that monitors attacks on free speech.²⁸¹ They have documented various attacks against journalists.²⁸² A significant number of attacks on the press come from the police.²⁸³ Police interference with the press’s ability to do its job is extreme and dangerous to any democracy.

Conclusion

Democracy is waning in the United States, and police have contributed to the problem. With far-right extremism in policing, increasing political rhetoric by on-duty police, active voter suppression, and the willingness to look the other way at the efforts of far-right groups in the country, policing has become a danger to democratic values and norms.

Extremist policing compounds the threats posed by American policing to American democracy—the social and political estrangement highlighted by Bell, the lack of accountability in policing framed by Friedman and Ponomarenko, and the inconsistency in law enforcement written about by Forde-Mazrui and Natapoff—are significant problems on their own.²⁸⁴ These scholars each individually sound their alarms about how American policing undercuts American democracy.

Each critique of policing: estrangement, lack of accountability, and inconsistency in law enforcement, demonstrates how extremist policing can go unchecked. Social and political estrangement mean that communities of color have no one and no reason to complain to about extremist police. The lack of accountability enjoyed by police means that not only do those suffering from the whims of extremist police not bother to report it, but other officers on the force are also disincentivized to report extremist policing too. The uneven law enforcement that exists allows those not experiencing sustained police attention to be unaware of extremist policing tactics. The inconsistency between American democracy and American law enforcement has protected extremist police.

The hidden nature of extremism in policing is exacerbated by the warrior attitude of those in law enforcement, described by policing scholars like Stoughton.²⁸⁵ The warrior mindset means that police have little interest in improving their relationship with the communities they serve. They do not see themselves as serving that public. This warrior viewpoint, which could only develop and persist because of the lack of accountability the police have, is undemocratic. Warrior policing is extremist policing in a way that it views the public as an adversary, contrary to policing as a public service.

Furthermore, the warrior mindset and the extremism I have described have enabled the lawlessness described by both Natapoff and Moran. Natapoff illustrated a lack of interest in enforcing the law when members of the public, whom the police regard little, are the victims.²⁸⁶ While Moran describes a lawlessness about police behavior to benefit themselves,²⁸⁷ both types of refusal to enforce law are undemocratic.

The path forward to rid the American policing force of officers at odds with American democracy would require a number of policing reforms. One example would be better checks at hiring, routine audits of body-worn camera²⁸⁸, text messages, and other communications between officers once they are hired. There are Artificial Intelligence (AI) products on the market that can accomplish this easily now.²⁸⁹ Other simple solutions would be for police to have better and increased training about law enforcement interactions with protestors, members of the press, and political expression on the job. In 2022, even President Biden compiled a list of reforms and proposed policing reforms.²⁹⁰ However, any proposed reforms are meaningless without actual accountability for police.

Unfortunately, police departments lack the will to effectively police their own. One example—eight police officers in the Chicago Police Department were revealed to have ties to the Oath Keepers, the far-right extremist group, members of which attacked the Capitol on January 6^th.²⁹¹ But the police department refused to discipline the officers at all.²⁹² The department only interviewed the accused officers in short interviews. They did not interview any experts on the Oath Keepers or far-right extremism.²⁹³ A city watchdog group called the investigation deficient.²⁹⁴ The same department also retained an officer who lied to superiors regarding his membership in the far-right Proud Boys group.²⁹⁵ This is not unique to Chicago. As extremism expert Parkin and his colleagues put it, “there are numerous examples of police officials ignoring, downplaying, or outright defending officers involved in far-right extremism”.²⁹⁶

Not only are departments hesitant to take action against officers, but police power is also growing more entrenched in American politics across other sectors, with few signs of slowing. Police reform generally has seemed like an intractable problem. Even after the summer of 2020, when many sought to reduce funding to police and create other services to avoid crime, funding has largely been restored in most police departments.²⁹⁷ The Supreme Court has sanctioned racialized policing.²⁹⁸ And the strength of police unions has grown.²⁹⁹

One legal scholar has argued that the structure of the criminal legal system—across state, local, and federal jurisdictions, its mix of elected representatives and public servants, and its bureaucracies—has made reform difficult.³⁰⁰ She writes, “Public demand for change may or may not accord with the commitments, ideals, and culture of the bureaucracy’s front-line actors.³⁰¹

The New York Times Editorial Board sounded the alarm about the threat of “extremists in uniform”, citing my previous work about police officer bias.³⁰² They are right to focus on this important issue. The presence of far-right beliefs and support for the same within law enforcement has become a dire threat. But the Times’s solution—identifying officers with far-right views—is insufficient.³⁰³

Many have called for a shrinking of the police footprint in American life for a number of reasons.³⁰⁴ Others have called for criminal courts and police minimalism, in which the role of the criminal legal system is smaller.³⁰⁵ Democracy may just depend on heeding that call of abolition. With even modest reforms like firing problem officers so difficult to achieve³⁰⁶, perhaps abolishing policing as it exists now and restarting a new way of keeping people safe is called for. It would be easier and quicker than our current efforts at changing this centuries-old institution.

There is reason to believe that abolishing police increases safety as well as providing more freedoms for Americans. In addition to Black and Brown communities most threatened by current policing practices, all Americans would be safer from the threats to our national security and democracy posed by policing by simply eliminating their role in our society.

But America is moving in the opposite direction—the reach of police in our daily lives is enormous. Civilians are very likely and increasingly likely to come into contact with police against their will.³⁰⁷ In addition to the consensual and involuntary interactions with police, police have a greater role in our lives in ways in which the average American may not be aware. Police collect more and more information on everyday American people who have never committed a crime. This is done through facial recognition technology³⁰⁸ and license plate readers³⁰⁹, and the access to genealogy platforms that collect DNA profiles³¹⁰. State power and state monitoring of average Americans is a concern, even aside from the threat posed by extremist police.

The threat of extremist police within policing makes the threat more significant and more dangerous. American police departments have grown, with approximately 800,000 law enforcement officers nationwide.³¹¹ They have also become more and more militarized.³¹² But unlike the military, police keep peace not with a foreign adversary but are meant to be public servants for American citizens. Despite that purported role in our society, police face very little accountability when they commit violence.³¹³ It is very difficult to terminate, and sometimes even discipline, officers who misbehave. Law enforcement’s authority, size, weaponry and lack of accountability give them the ability to be the force of an authoritarian movement. Some small police departments have been completely disbanded rather than firing individual officers³¹⁴ because the task of ridding problematic officers is almost impossible.

As academics, activists, and community leaders begin to reimagine our institutions, including that of policing, it is important that those in power come to terms with the evidence that policing is not only dangerous to the individuals who have to interact with police, but that police have serious blind spots that make them dangerously unable to police the far-right. The inability to police the far-right is a threat to democracy. In addition, police officers engage in activities that make them unsafe to guard American democratic elections and even institutions.

We employ police to make us safer. There are significant financial and societal costs to this. But as it becomes clearer that policing not only makes some Americans unsafe, the threats to democracy and its institutions posed by policing undermine the very purpose and the costs of police.

*Associate Professor of Law. Many thanks to Jon Anderson, Emmanuel Armand, Paul Butler, Erin Carroll, Shaw Drake, Cynthia Godsoe, Aderson Francois, Aaron Littman, Rachel Moran, Lucius Outlaw III, Ngozi Okidegbe, Eloise Pasachoff, Jess Pishko, Jeff Selbin, Maneka Sinha, Neel Sukhatme, David Super, and Kate Weisburd for their feedback and guidance. Thank you to Sessen Berhane, Ariel June, and Kate Medwar-Vanderlinden for excellent research help.

References:

1
Council on Foreign Relations, Far-Right Terrorism in the United States, https://www.cfr.org/timeline/far-right-terrorism-united-states (last visited Nov. 2, 2025) (explaining that “in recent years, far right terrorism has become a leading national security concern for the United States”).
2
See generally Timothy Gutmann, Extremism and Defense of Democracy, TheUniversity of Chicago Divinity School, (Dec. 2, 2021) https://divinity.uchicago.edu/sightings/articles/extremism-and-defense-democracy; Astrid Bötticher, Towards Academic Consensus Definitions of Radicalism and Extremism, 11 Perspectives on Terrorism 73, 73–77 (2017); Anthony Painter, Democratic stress, the populist signal and extremist threat, Policy network (2013).
3
See Luke Barr, Domestic terrorism-related cases increased by more than 350% over 8 years: Watchdog, ABC News (Feb. 28, 2023, at 21:14 EST), https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/domestic-terrorism-related-cases-increased-350-8-years/story?id=97533553.
4
Militia Movement, Southern Poverty Law Ctr., https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/ideology/militia-movement (last visited Nov. 2, 2025).
5
There are leftist extremists as well. Those extremists may very well also pose a threat to democracy, but, given that police seem more drawn towards the right than the left, this article focuses primarily on far-right extremists in law enforcement.
6
Mike German, White Supremacist Links to Law Enforcement Are an Urgent Concern, Brennan Center (Sep. 1, 2020), https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/white-supremacist-links-law-enforcement-are-urgent-concern.
7
Nirej Sekhon, Police and the Limit of Law, 119 Colum. L. Rev. 1711 (2019) (describing police officers as “street sovereigns”). NOTE: need to look at the source pulled for footnote 43 to see the page numbers
8
Alec Karakatsanis, Policing, Mass Imprisonment, and the Failure of American Lawyers, 128 Harv. L. Rev. F. 253 (2015); See also Micol Seigel, Violence work: policing and power, 59(4) Race & Class, 15–33 (2018); Jason R. Silver et al., Traditional Police Culture, Use of Force, and Procedural Justice: Investigating Individual, Organizational, and Contextual Factors, 34(7) Just. Q., 1272–1309 (2017).
9
Ward Churchill & Jim Vander Wall, The COINTELPRO Papers: Documents from the FBI’s Secret Wars Against Domestic Dissent 8 (1990), https://archive.org/details/cointelpropapers0000chur/page/n3/mode/2up; Hector Tobar, Deputies in ‘Neo-Nazi’ Gang, Judge Found: Sheriff’s Department: Many at Lynwood office have engaged in racially motivated violence against blacks and Latinos, jurists wrote., L.A. Times (Oct. 12, 1991, at 00:00 PT), https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-10-12-me-107-story.html; Geoff Ward, Living Histories of White Supremacist Policing, 15 Du Bois Rev.1, 167–184 (2018); Courtney M. Echols, Anti-Blackness is the American Way: Assessing the Relationship Between Chattel Slavery, Lynchings, & Police Violence During the Civil Rights Movement, 14(2) Race and Just., 217–232 (2022).
10
After the Oklahoma City bombing, the FBI shifted its priorities, reassigning large numbers of agents to work domestic terrorism cases and hiring many new agents. It significantly expanded the number of Joint Terrorism Task Forces across the country and went to Congress with a lengthy “want” list. The Justice Department funded an anti-terrorist training program for senior state and local law enforcement executives. The Significance of the Oklahoma City Bombing, ADL (Mar. 27, 2015), https://www.adl.org/resources/news/significance-oklahoma-city-bombing.
11
Matthew C. Waxman, Police and National Security: American Local Law Enforcement and Counter-Terrorism after 9/11, 3 J. Nat’l Sec. L. & Pol’y 377 (2009); Post 9-11 Policing: The Crime Control – Homeland Security Paradigm, Taking Command of New Realities, NCJRS Virtual Library (Sept. 2005), https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/post-9-11-policing-crime-control-homeland-security-paradigm-taking.
12
Jerome H, Skolnick, Justice Without Trial: Law Enforcement In Democratic Society 221 (4th ed. 2011) (“For some, the institution of policing became the first line of defense against domestic threats to security.”).
13
Of course, a significant number of people become police after completing military service and training. While “just 6 percent of the population at large has served in the military . . . 19 percent of police officers are veterans.” Simone Weichselbaum, Beth Schwartzapfel, & Tom Meagher, When Warriors Put On the Badge, The Marshall Project (Mar. 30, 2017, at 06:00 EST), https://www.themarshallproject.org/2017/03/30/when-warriors-put-on-the-badge; The American military may be facing a similar problem of extremism in its ranks. See Jacob Ware, The Violent Far-Right Terrorist Threat to the U.S. Military, Council on Foreign Relations (Jan. 31, 2023, at 10:32 EST), https://www.cfr.org/blog/violent-far-right-terrorist-threat-us-military; Daniel Koehler, From Superiority to Supremacy: Exploring the Vulnerability of Military and Police Special Forces to Extreme Right Radicalization, 48 Stud. in Conflict & Terrorism, 115-138 (June 20, 2022), https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1057610X.2022.2090047. But see Press Release, RAND, Support for Extremism Among U.S. Military Veterans Is Similar to Public at Large (May 23, 2023), https://www.rand.org/news/press/2023/05/23.html.
14
See infra Section II.
15
See infra Section I.
16
Jonathan Ben-Menachem, The Cops at the Capitol, The Appeal (Jan. 13, 2021), https://theappeal.org/the-cops-at-the-capitol/#:~:text=Law%20enforcement%20officers%20from%20around%20the%20country,Cherry/Getty%20Images)%20Jonathan%20Ben%2DMenachem%20Jan%2013%2C%202021.; Jordan Fischer, Former Maryland officer who shot stabbing suspect sentence to prison for lobbing smoke bomb at police on Jan. 6, WUSA9 (Nov. 22, 2024), https://www.wusa9.com/article/news/national/capitol-riots/former-maryland-officer-sentenced-to-prison-for-throwing-smoke-bomb-at-police-on-jan-6-justin-lee-capitol-riot-montgomery-county-rockville/65-654a46c6-fed1-4aea-b943-3ac9f1c02a6c; Ed Shanahan, Ex-Military Police Officer Sentenced to Prison for Role in Capitol Riot, N.Y. Times (updated Oct. 31, 2024), https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/23/nyregion/jan-6-gregory-yetman-sentenced.html.
17
See Vida B. Johnson, KKK in the PD: White Supremacist Police and What to do About It, 23 Lewis & Clark L. Rev. 205 (2019).
18
See infra Section III.
19
See Rich Schapiro, A ‘constitutional sheriff’ tried to seize voting machines in 2020. Officials are bracing for a repeat., NBC News (Nov. 3, 2024), https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/constitutional-sheriff-tried-seize-voting-machines-2020-officials-are-rcna177906.
20
See generally Rachel Moran, Scofflaw Law Enforcement, 69 Wayne L. Rev., 31–53 (2023).
21
See infra Section IV.A.
22
Id.
23
[Selective enforcement scholarship.]
24
Benjamin Levin, What’s Wrong with Police Unions, 120 Colum. L. Rev 1333, 1337–38 (2020) (“For decades, criminal procedure scholars have focused on judicial opinions as defining and shaping police practices. They framed the law of policing in terms of appellate judges’ constitutional decisions. Formal and informal rules crafted outside the courtroom by municipalities, police unions, and police departments had little place in scholarly discourse on and critique of police misconduct. But, spurred by the rise of the Movement for Black Lives, and greater public access to police union contracts, police unions and their collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) are becoming a bigger part of the conversation.”); Joanna C. Schwartz, Who Can Police the Police?, Vol. 2016 Univ. of Chi. Legal F. 437 (2016); Lee Kraftchick, How Hard Is It to Fire a Police Officer?: A Look At One Local Government’s Experience and Some Possibilities for Reform, 50 Stetson L. Rev. 491, 492.
25
See generally Alexandra Natapoff, The Penal Pyramid, in The New Criminal Justice Thinking, (Sharon Dolovich & Alexandra Natapoff ed., 2017); Devon W. Carbado, From Stopping Black People to Killing Black People: The Fourth Amendment Pathways to Violence, 105 Calif. L. Rev. 125, 128 (2017). (“Racially disproportionate policing is endemic…”). See also Paul Butler, The White Fourth Amendment, 43 Tex. Tech L. Rev 245 (2010) (describing how the Fourth Amendment protects Whites more than Black people).
26
Dan Keating & Kevin Uhrmacher, In urban areas, police are consistently much whiter than the people they serve, Wash. Post (June 4, 2020), https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/06/04/urban-areas-police-are-consistently-much-whiter-than-people-they-serve/.
27
See Sam Metz, Nevada becomes more populous and diverse, but growth slows, AP News (Aug. 12, 2021, at 19:26 EST), https://apnews.com/article/nevada-census-2020-e4f2e0a7c26bfd3c3b5434d18664b383; Scott Rodd, California’s Population is Majority-Minority. The Attorneys Who Represent It Are Overwhelmingly White, Cap. Pub. Radio (June 20, 2019), https://www.capradio.org/articles/2019/06/20/californias-population-is-majority-minority-the-attorneys-who-represent-it-are-overwhelmingly-white/.
28
Id.
29
See David A. Graham, America Is Losing Its Black Police Officers, The Atlantic (Oct. 4, 2021), https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/10/america-is-losing-its-black-police-officers/620291/.
30
See Julia Harte, Insight: Police back Republican candidates in U.S. midterms, even those at Jan. 6 Riot, Reuters (Nov. 3, 2022), https://www.reuters.com/world/us/police-back-republican-candidates-us-midterms-even-those-jan-6-riot-2022-11-03/; Philip Bump, Police made a lot more reported contributions in 2020 than normal – mostly to Republicans, Wash. Post (Feb. 25, 2021) https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/02/25/police-made-lot-more-reported-contributions-2020-than-normal-mostly-republicans/.
31
National Immigration Forum, The ‘Great Replacement’ Theory, Explained, p. 1 (https://immigrationforum.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Replacement-Theory-Explainer-1122.pdf)(explaining that the “great replacement” theory, also known as “white replacement theory,” is a racist conspiracy that believes that the embrace of immigration policies, particularly those impacting non-White immigrants—are part of a plot designed to undermine or “replace” the political power and culture of White people living in Western countries).
32
Megan Brenan, U.S. Confidence in Institutions Mostly Flat, but Police Up, Gallup (July 15, 2024), https://news.gallup.com/poll/647303/confidence-institutions-mostly-flat-police.aspx#:~:text=Faith%20in%20the%20police%20fell,a%20record%20low%20of%2043%25.
33
See infra Section II.
34
Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow, 9 Ohio St. J. Crim. L. 7, 8 (2011).
35
See Derecka Purnell, Becoming Abolitionists: Police, Protests, and the Pursuit of Freedom, (1st ed. 2021).
36
See Amna A. Akbar, An Abolitionist Horizon for (Police) Reform, 108 Calif. L. Rev. 1781 (2020).
37
Jamelia N. Morgan, Policing Under Disability Law, 73 Stan. L. Rev. 1401, 1465 (2021) (advocating for decriminalization of low-level offenses to lessen impact on disabled people targeted by the police and focusing instead on a public health approach).
38
“They may claim to preserve public safety and protect the vulnerable, but police consistently perpetrate violence while failing to create safety for the vast majority of the population, no matter how much money we throw at them.” Mariame Kaba & Andrea J. Ritchie, Why We Don’t Say “Reform the Police”, The Nation (Sept. 2, 2022), https://www.thenation.com/article/society/no-more-police-excerpt/.
39
“In the United States, law is idealized as a product of tripartite government, an exercise of democratic process or popular will held in place by checks and balances. But whichever branch you examine—the judiciary, the legislatures, or the executive—individually or collectively, at the local, state, or federal level, you will not find a map of democratic process or popular will. The Supreme Court is composed of nine Justices with life tenure and the power to veto legislation and executive action; Congress is captured by corporate power and gerrymandered districts with two senators per state regardless of population; and the route to the presidency is carved out of the Electoral College rather than the popular vote.” Amna Akbar, Reform and Struggles Over Life, Death, and Democracy, 132 Yale L. Rev. 2497, 2500 (2023).
40
The Economist Intelligence Unit, Democracy index 2016 Revenge of the “deplorables” (2016), https://impact.economist.com/perspectives/sites/default/files/The%20EIU%27s%202016%20Democracy%20Index_0.pdf.
41
Miriam Berger, U.S. listed as a ‘backsliding’ democracy for first time in report by European think tank, Wash. Post (Nov. 22, 2021), https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/11/22/united-states-backsliding-democracies-list-first-time; see also Inst. for Democracy and Electoral Resistance, The Global State of Democracy Report 2021(2021), https://www.idea.int/gsod-2021/global-report/.
42
“Although incidents from the left are on the rise, political violence still comes overwhelmingly from the right, whether one looks at the Global Terrorism Database, FBI statistics, or other government or independent counts.” Rachel Kleinfeld, The Rise of Political Violence in the United States, 32 Journal of Democracy 160 (2021), https://www.journalofdemocracy.org/articles/the-rise-of-political-violence-in-the-united-states/.
43
See Rachel Moran, In Police We Trust, 62 Vill. L. Rev. 953, 954–956 (2017); Mallory Newall, Chris Jackson, & Johnny Sawyer, Americans’ trust in law enforcement, desire to protect law and order on the rise, Ipsos, Mar. 5, 2021, https://www.ipsos.com/en-us/americans-trust-law-enforcement-desire-protect-law-and-order-rise; Justin Nix et al., Trust in the police: The influence of procedural justice and perceived collective efficacy., 61 Crime & Delinquency, 610–640 (2015).
44
What is democracy?, Georgetown University, https://government.georgetown.edu/news/democracy-governance/what-is-democracy/.
45
See Id.
46
Sekhon, supra note 8, at 1718.
47
See, e.g., Zack Beauchamp, Map: The most heavily policed countries in the world, VOX (Oct. 8, 2014, at 10:10 EDT) https://www.vox.com/2014/10/8/6939731/map-the-most-heavily-policed-countries-around-the-world; Charles T. Call, Fighting the autocratic slide in Central America, The Brookings Inst. (Dec. 3, 2021) https://www.brookings.edu/articles/fighting-the-autocratic-slide-in-central-america/ (explaining how Nicaraguan and El Salvadoran authoritarian leaders have used police to search, investigate and imprison critical journalists, human rights groups, opposition leaders, and civilians).
48
See Sheena Chestnut Greitens, Dictators and their secret police: Coercive institutions and state violence 104–105, 279 (2016).
49
Id.
50
Kim Forde-Mazrui, Ruling Out the Rule of Law, 60 Vand. L. Rev. 1497, 1500 (2007).
51
Danieli Evans, Carceral Socialization as Voter Suppression, 28 Mich. J. of Race & L. 39 (2023).
52
Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806 (1996) (finding that police can stop citizens on pretextual basis); See Seth W. Stoughton, Principled Policing: Warrior Cops and Guardian Officers, 51, Wake Forest L. Rev. 611, 647 (2016) (“courts have privileged law enforcement interests . . .”); See also Carbado, supra note 26 (describing how U.S. Supreme Court case law gives extreme deference to police and enables police violence against people of color).
53
Marc F. Plattner, From Liberalism to Liberal Democracy, 10 J. of Democracy, 121, (1999) (explaining that “wherever one finds liberalism (understood as constitutional and limited government, the rule of law, and the protection of individual rights), it is almost invariably coupled with democracy (understood as the selection of government officials by universal suffrage)”); Yasutomo Morigiwa, The Laws of a Nation: The Essential Formula for a Liberal and Democratic State, 1 Wm. & Mary Bill of Rts. J. 187, 198 (1992).
54
See Tyler Adams, Factors in Police Misconduct Arbitration Outcomes: What Does It Take to Fire a Bad Cop?, 32 A.B.A. J. Lab. & Emp. L. 133, 136–38 (2016); See Stephen Rushin, Police Arbitration, 74 Vand. L. Rev. 1023 (2021); Theresa Vargas, D.C. has a problem with firing bad cops. So do many places., Wash. Post (Oct. 12, 2022), https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/10/12/police-fire-rehire-audit/.
55
Samuel Walker, Governing the American Police: Wrestling with the Problems of Democracy, 15 U. of Chi. Legal F. 615, 616 (2016).
56
Barry Friedman & Maria Ponomarenko, Democratic Policing, 90 N.Y.U. L. Rev. 1827 (2016).
57
Alexandra Natapoff, Underenforcement, 75 Fordham L. Rev. 1715, 1718-19 (2006).
58
See Monica C. Bell, Police Reform and the Dismantling of Legal Estrangement, 126 Yale L. J. 2054, 2066(2017).
59
Id. at 2086, 2143, 2145.
60
Ed White, Court affirms conviction of 2 key people in plot to kidnap Michigan’s governor, AP News (Apr. 1, 2025), https://apnews.com/article/michigan-whitmer-kidnapping-plot-convictions-042227f68a3fcc49ea91126388cd91de.
61
Benjamin Weiser & Ali Watkins, Cesar Sayoc, Who Mailed Pipe Bombs to Trump Critics, Is Sentenced to 20 Years, N.Y. Times (Aug. 5, 2019), https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/05/nyregion/cesar-sayoc-sentencing-pipe-bombing.html.
62
Ben Finley, What is known and not known about the attempt on Trump’s life and its aftermath, AP News (July 17, 2024, at 00:01 EST), https://apnews.com/article/trump-assassination-attempt-crooks-what-to-know-1f168acc452a55e1c5d5f748aa2bbc8d.
63
Terry Collins & Bart Jansen, Accused Paul Pelosi attacker told police officer: ‘There is evil in Washington’, USA Today (Dec. 15, 2022, at 08:55 ET), https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2022/12/14/paul-pelosi-attack/10884717002/.
64
María Luisa Paúl, Michigan AG says she was among targets in plot to kill Jewish officials, Wash. Post (Mar. 3, 2023), https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2023/03/03/threats-jewish-officials-michigan-fbi/.
65
Jeff Amy & Lindsay Whitehurst, Judges Overseeing Trump cases in New York and DC are latest Targets as bogus ‘swatting’ calls surge, Associated Press (Jan. 11, 2024), https://apnews.com/article/swatting-calls-marjorie-taylor-greene-rick-scott-d568818925c99c8cf17467f737b99e97.
66
See notes 55-59.
67
“Although incidents from the left are on the rise, political violence still comes overwhelmingly from the right, whether one looks at the Global Terrorism Database, FBI statistics, or other government or independent counts.” Rachel Kleinfeld, supra note 43.
68
See note 41.
69
Mark Pitcavage, Surveying the Landscape of the American Far Right (2019) https://extremism.gwu.edu/sites/g/files/zaxdzs5746/files/Surveying%20The%20Landscape%20of%20the%20American%20Far%20Right_0.pdf
70
Southern Poverty Law Center, Antigovernment General, https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/ideology/antigovernment-general
71
Id. These groups often purport that the government is tyrannical and dominated or controlled by leftist elites who will confiscate their guns, corrupt children, and otherwise undermine their freedom.
72
Matthew Grindal and Kristin Haltinner, White Racial Identity and Its Link to Support for far-Right Groups: A Test of Social Psychological Model, Social Sciences, June 25, 2023. Available at: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/12/7/369.
73
William H. Frey, White and youth populations losses contributed most to the nation’s growth slowdown, new census data reveals, Brookings (Aug. 1, 2022), https://www.brookings.edu/articles/white-and-youth-population-losses-contributed-most-to-the-nations-growth-slowdown-new-census-data-reveals/
74
75
Immigration Attitudes and Conspiratorial Thinkers: A study Issued on the 10th Anniversary of The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, AP NORC (May 9, 2022), https://apnorc.org/projects/immigration-attitudes-and-conspiratorial-thinkers/?doing_wp_cron=1679001396.2919640541076660156250.
76
Cassie Miller, SPLC Poll Finds Substantial Support for ‘Great Replacement’ Theory and Other Hard-Right Ideas, S. Poverty L. Ctr. (Jun. 1, 2022), https://www.splcenter.org/news/2022/06/01/poll-finds-support-great-replacement-hard-right-ideas; Will Carless, Month before Buffalo shooting, poll finds, 7 in 10 Republicans believed in ‘great replacement’ ideas, USA Today (Jun. 1, 2022, 5:00 AM), https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2022/06/01/great-replacement-theory-poll-republicans-democrats/7461913001/?gnt-cfr=1.
77
Gary Langer, 1 in 10 Say It’s Acceptable to Hold Neo-Nazi Views, ABC News (Aug. 21, 2017,), https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/28-approve-trumps-response-charlottesville-poll/story?id=49334079.
78
Large Majority of the Public Views Prosecution of Capitol Rioters as ‘Very Important’, Pew Research Center (Mar. 18, 2021), https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/03/18/large-majority-of-the-public-views-prosecution-of-capitol-rioters-as-very-important/.
79
A Christian Nation? Understanding the Threat of Christian Nationalism to American Democracy and Culture, Public Religion Research Institute (Feb. 8, 2023), https://prri.org/research/a-christian-nation-understanding-the-threat-of-christian-nationalism-to-american-democracy-and-culture/.
80
Id.
81
There are approximately 720,000 police in the United States. See Number of full-time law enforcement officers in the United States from 2004 to 2023, Statista (Nov. 28, 2025), https://www.statista.com/statistics/191694/number-of-law-enforcement-officers-in-the-us/#:~:text=Table_title:%20Number%20of%20full%2Dtime%20law%20enforcement%20officers,Number%20of%20law%20enforcement%20officers:%20696%2C644%20%7C;Claudia Lauer, Police officer hiring in US increases in 2023 after years of decline, survey shows, Associated Press, April 29, 2024, https://apnews.com/article/police-staffing-increases-2023-shortage-7e39156a80de2d75e22bd554adc8f887. There are a significant number of special police officers, private security who have been deputized by the city or the state to make arrests. See Alana Semuels, Private Security Guards Are Replacing Police Across America, Time (May 2, 2023, 8:00 AM) https://time.com/6275440/insecure-private-security-replacing-police/. Altogether there are at least 1 million people engaged in state sanctioned law enforcements. U.S. Census Bureau, 2023 Annual Survey of Public Employment & Payroll (Mar. 2023), https://www.census.gov/data/datasets/2023/econ/apes/annual-apes.html. It is possible that at least 100,000 of them are extremist police since `10% of people hold far-right extremist views.
82
See Stephone K. Addison, An Examination of Perceived Factors of Influencing Mass Killings in the United States of America, 104 J.L. Pol’y & Globalization 56 (2020); See also Ivana Saric, All U.S. extremist mass killings in 2022 linked to far right, report says, Axios (Feb. 23, 2023), https://www.axios.com/2023/02/23/mass-killings-extremism-adl-report-2022.
83
Joanna Walters & Alvin Chang, Far-Right Terror Poses Bigger Threat to US than Islamist Extremism Post-9/11, The Guardian (Sept. 8, 2021, 3:00 PM), https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/sep/08/post-911-domestic-terror.
84
See Christopher A. Wray, Director, Fed. Bureau of Investigation, Statement Before the United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary at a Hearing Entitled “Oversight of the Federal Bureau of Investigation,” (Dec. 5, 2023); see also Eric Tucker & Mary Clare Jalonick, FBI chief warns violent ‘domestic terrorism’ growing in US, AP News (March 2, 2021), https://apnews.com/article/fbi-chris-wray-testify-capitol-riot-9a5539af34b15338bb5c4923907eeb67; Eileen Sullivan & Katie Benner, Top law enforcement officials say the biggest domestic terror threat comes from white supremacists, N.Y. Times (May 12, 2021). https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/12/us/politics/domestic-terror-white-supremacists.html.
85
Alanna Durkin Richer & Michael Kunzelman, EXPLAINER: A Look at Far-Right Extremists in Jan. 6 Riot, AP News (June 10, 2022), https://apnews.com/article/capitol-siege-proud-boys-donald-trump-congress-government-and-politics-a8baa24af07b20ab792f4ef6f4481fac
86
See Miles J. Herszenhorn, Why Did Trump Supporters Storm the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6? Because of Trump, New Harvard Study Finds, The Harvard Crimson (July 26, 2022), https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2022/7/26/trump-jan-6-hks-study/.
87
See Johnson, supra note 18.
88
Id.
89
See Nicole Duncan-Smith, “I’ll bury that N—r in My Fields”: Police Probe Exposes ‘Very Disturbing Texts Sent in Personal Chat Among Dozens of Officers in Bay Area; City’s Black Mayor Not Exempt from Threats, Atlanta Black Star, (Apr. 15, 2015), https://atlantablackstar.com/2023/04/15/ill-bury-that-n-r-in-my-fields-police-probe-exposes-very-disturbing-texts-sent-in-personal-chat-among-dozens-of-officers-in-bay-area-citys-black-mayor-not-exempt/.
90
Christian Martinez, Torrance Pays $750,000 to Man After Police Accused of Painting Swastika in His Car, L.A. Times (Mar. 20, 2023, 5:00 AM), https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-03-20/torrance-pays-750-000-to-man-after-police-allegedly-decorate-his-car-with-a-swastika.
91
NC Police Officers’ Racist Rant Caught on Tape: ‘I Can’t Wait’ for Race War, MSNBC (June 25, 2020), https://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/nc-police-officers-racist-rant-caught-on-tape-i-can-t-wait-for-race-war-86024261643.
92
N’dea Yancey-Bragg, Mississippi Police Chief Fired After Leaked Audio Captured Racist Rant, Him Bragging About Killing 13 People, USA Today, (July 23, 2022), https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2022/07/22/mississippi-police-chief-fired-killing-racist-audio/10126987002/.
93
Mariel Padilla, Michigan Police Officer Terminated After KKK Application Was Found in His Home, N.Y. Times (Sept. 13, 2019), https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/13/us/officer-charles-anderson-ku-klux-klan.html.
94
Larry Parnass, Hitler Photo ‘Highly Offensive’ Williamstown’s Top Board Says. But It Lacks the Power to Fire Him, Berkshire Eagle, (Aug. 31, 2021), https://www.berkshireeagle.com/news/northern_berkshires/williamstown-board-lacks-power-to-fire-officer-hitler-photo/article_be9d757c-0aaa-11ec-ad80-6ff3f1a649c2.html.
95
David Merchan, San Jose Police Officer Resigns after Disgusting Racist Text Messages Released, ABC News (Nov. 6, 2023, 9:22 PM),https://abcnews.go.com/US/san-jose-police-officer-resigns-after-disgusting-racist/story?id=104658409.
96
Arusha Gordon, The First Amendment, Policing, and White Supremacy in America, 28 Tex. J. on Civ. Liberties & Civ. Rts. 33 (2022); Anne Speckhard & Molly Ellenberg, Police and Violent Extremism, Int’l Ctr. for the Study of Violent Extremism (Jan. 2, 2023), https://icsve.org/police-and-violent-extremism/.
97
Speckhard & Ellenberg, supra note 98, at 5.
98
U.S. Dep’t of Justice, Civil Rights Div., Investigation of the Chicago Police Department (2017), https://www.justice.gov/opa/file/925846/download.
99
U.S. Dep’t of Justice, Civil Rights Div., Investigation of the Ferguson Police Department (2015), https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/opa/press- releases/attachments/2015/03/04/ferguson_police_department_report.pdf.
100
U.S. Dep’t of Justice, Civil Rights Div., Investigation of the Louisville Metro Police Department and Louisville Metro Government (2023), https://www.justice.gov/crt/case-document/file/1572951/download.
101
Database, The Plain View Project (June 20, 2019), https://www.plainviewproject.org/data.
102
Id.
103
See Annie Sweeney & Alice Yin, Chicago Cop Who Allegedly Lied About Proud Boys Affiliation Gets 120-Day Suspension, After Watchdog Pushed Superintendent to Review Case and Consider Firing Officer, Chicago Tribune (Oct. 19, 2022, 3:00 PM).
104
See Mike Giglio, A Pro-Trump Militant Group Has Recruited Thousands of Police, Soldiers, and Veterans, The Atlantic (Nov. 2020), https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/11/right-wing-militias-civil-war/616473/.
105
See Three Percenters, ADL (July 13, 2020), https://www.adl.org/resources/backgrounder/three-percenters; WIS News 10 Staff & Ed Payne, Police officer put on administrative duty for Three Percenters sticker on personal vehicle, KBTX News 3 (Jul. 12, 2021), https://www.kbtx.com/2021/07/12/police-officer-penalized-three-percenters-sticker-personal-vehicle/.
106
See appendices.
107
Dan Mihalopoulos, Tom Schuba, & Kevin G. Hall, Chicago police officers with ties to extremist Oath Keepers stay on the force. Some have troubling records, Chicago Sun-Times (Oct. 22, 2023, 7:22 AM), https://chicago.suntimes.com/2023/10/22/23911926/oath-keepers-investigation-part-one-app-apple-news-only; Tom Coulter & Christopher Damien, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco paid for a year-long membership with Oath Keepers in 2014, Desert Sun (Oct. 5, 2021, 2:28 PM), https://www.desertsun.com/story/news/local/2021/10/05/riverside-county-sheriff-chad-bianco-paid-year-long-membership-oath-keepers-2014/6011361001/.
108
See Alanna Durkin Richer & Michael Kunzelman, Elected Officials, Police Officers and Members of Military on Oath Keepers Membership List, Report Says, PBS (Sept. 7, 2022, 10:32 AM), https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/elected-officials-police-officers-and-members-of-military-on-oath-keepers-membership-list-report-says.
109
Jonathan Levinson, Dozens of Oregon Law Enforcement Officers Have Been Members of the Far-Right Oath Keepers Militia, OPD (Oct. 15, 2021, 2:00 PM), https://www.opb.org/article/2021/10/15/dozens-of-oregon-law-enforcement-officers-joined-far-right-oath-keepers-militia/.
110
Id.
111
See Mike German Hidden in Plain Sight: Racism, White Supremacy, and Far-Right Militancy in Law Enforcement, The Brennan Ctr.,(2020), https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/hidden-plain-sight-racism-white-supremacy-and-far-right-militancy-law.
112
See Kimberly Kindy, Boosted by the Pandemic, ‘Constitutional Sheriffs’ Are a Political Force, Wash. Post (Nov. 2, 2021, 6:00 AM), https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/constitutional-sheriffs-elections-trump-pandemic/2021/11/01/4c14c764-368b-11ec-91dc-551d44733e2d_story.html.
113
Domestic Terrorism, The Sovereign Citizen Movement, The Federal Bureau of Investigation (Apr. 13, 2010), https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/news/stories/2010/april/sovereigncitizens_041310/domestic-terrorism-the-sovereign-citizen-movement.
114
Id.
115
Emily M. Farris & Mirya R. Holman, Sheriffs, Right-Wing Extremism, and the Limits of U.S. Federalism During a Crisis, 104 Soc. Sci. Q. 59, 60 (2023)
116
Id.
117
Id.
118
Id. at 65.
119
Proud Boys, The Southern Poverty Law Center, https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/group/proud-boys.
120
See appendix.
121
Michael Kunzelman, Messages: Officer Often Fed Information to Proud Boys Leader, AP News (Feb. 15, 2023), https://apnews.com/article/biden-proud-boys-washington-law-enforcement-capitol-siege-07b606c578399a4e24cc382a17f6f470.
122
Amanda Garrett & Sean McDonnell, Akron Police Clear Officer After Activists Say He Has a Three Percenter Tattoo, Akron Beacon Journal (June 6, 2021), https://www.beaconjournal.com/story/news/2021/06/06/three-percenters-akron-activists-accuse-police-officer-extremist-tattoo/7548805002/.
123
Jordan Smith, South Bend Mayor Says He’s Shifted His View on Militia Group; Election Foes Weigh in, South Bend Tribune (Feb. 4, 2023, 3:33 PM), https://www.southbendtribune.com/story/news/local/2023/02/04/mayor-now-says-no-place-in-our-city-for-groups-like-three-percenters/69872301007/.
124
Tom Schuba, Under pressure from city’s watchdog, CPD reopens probe of cop who wore extremist symbol during racial justice protest, Chi. Sun-Times (Mar. 6, 2023, at 18 :24 EDT), https://chicago.suntimes.com/crime/2023/3/6/23627776/three-percenter-cpd-chicago-police-department-cop-extremist-symbol-racial-justice-protest-proud-boy.
125
Ed Payne, Police officer put on administrative duty for Three Percenters sticker on personal vehicle, WHSV (July 12, 2021, at 17:21 EDT), https://www.whsv.com/2021/07/12/police-officer-penalized-three-percenters-sticker-personal-vehicle/.
126
Christine Byers, The story behind the picture of 3 Percenters flag at St. Louis County officer’s house, KSDK (Mar. 5, 2021, at 14:31 CST), https://www.ksdk.com/article/news/crime/byers-beat/three-percenters-flag-st-louis-county-officer-house/63-65b98e05-3907-4289-8d6d-0b1ee10cf64d.
127
Press Release, Off. of Pub. Affs. for the U.S. Dep’t of Just., Four Additional Oath Keepers Sentenced for Seditious Conspiracy Related to U.S. Capitol Breach (June 2, 2023), https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/four-additional-oath-keepers-sentenced-seditious-conspiracy-related-us-capitol-breach; Press Release, Off. of Pub. Affs. for the U.S. Dep’t of Just., Ct. Sentences Two Oath Keepers Leaders on Seditious Conspiracy and Other Charges Related to U.S. Capitol Breach (May 25, 2023), https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/court-sentences-two-oath-keepers-leaders-seditious-conspiracy-and-other-charges-related-us.
128
Hannah Rabinowitz, Holmes Lybrand & Sonnet Swire, Oath Keepers leader and associates convicted of multiple charges in seditious conspiracy case, CNN (Nov. 30, 2022, at 04:33 EST), https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/29/politics/oath-keepers-convicted-verdict-charges-january-6-seditious-conspiracy/index.html.
129
Press Release, Off. of Pub. Affs. for the U.S. Dep’t of Just., Jury Convicts Four Leaders of the Proud Boys of Seditious Conspiracy Related to U.S. Capitol Breach (May 4, 2023), https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/jury-convicts-four-leaders-proud-boys-seditious-conspiracy-related-us-capitol-breach.
130
Spencer S. Hsu, Alleged Three Percenter who marched with Proud Boys on Jan. 6 pleads guilty, Wash. Post (Mar. 6, 2023), https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/03/06/three-percenters-proud-boys-jan-6-guilty-plea/; Ryan J. Reilly, Judge locks up ‘Three Percenter’ militia members in Jan. 6 obstruction case, NBC News (Apr. 20, 2024, at 16:01 EDT), https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/judge-locks-three-percenter-militia-members-jan-6-obstruction-case-rcna148456.
131
Jonathan Ben-Menachem, The Cops at the Capitol, The Appeal (Jan. 13, 2021), https://theappeal.org/the-cops-at-the-capitol/.
132
Vimal Patel, Ex-Capitol Police Officer Found Guilty of Obstruction in Jan. 6 Case, N.Y. Times (Oct. 28, 2022), https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/28/us/jan-6-capital-officer-convicted.html; Press Release, U.S. Att’y’s Off., D.C., Off-Duty Police Officer Sentenced to 87 Months in Prison on Charges Related to Capitol Breach (Aug. 11, 2022), https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/pr/duty-police-officer-sentenced-87-months-prison-charges-related-capitol-breach.
133
Hurubie Meko, Former N.Y.P.D. Officer Is Convicted of Taking Part in Capitol Riot, N.Y. Times (Mar. 10, 2023), https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/10/nyregion/sara-carpenter-nypd-jan-6-guilty.html; Alanna Durkin Richer, Ex-Boston officer charged with assaulting cop in Jan. 6 riot, AP News (Mar. 30, 2023, at 16:44 EDT), https://apnews.com/article/boston-police-jan-6-capitol-riot.
134
Ben-Menachem, supra note 133.
135
Aguilar v. Tex., 378 U.S. 108 (1964); Spinelli v. United States, 393 U.S. 410 (1969); Fla. v. J.L., 529 U.S. 266, (2000).
136
Hannah Reale, Middlesex DA launches investigation into Woburn cop who allegedly helped organize 2017 Charlottesville rally, GBH News (Oct. 17, 2022), https://www.wgbh.org/news/local/2022-10-14/middlesex-da-launches-investigation-into-woburn-cop-who-allegedly-helped-organize-2017-charlottesville-rally; Morgan Rousseau, More details emerge on ex-Woburn cop who helped plan Charlottesville rally, Boston.com (Oct. 22, 2022), https://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2022/10/22/more-details-emerge-on-ex-woburn-cop-who-helped-plan-charlottesville-rally/.
137
See Mike Mather, Professor: White Supremacists Used Civil Rights Script to Create ‘Unite the Right’ Rally, UVA Today (Jul. 12, 2023), https://news.virginia.edu/content/professor-white-supremacists-used-civil-rights-script-create-unite-right-rally.
138
Bernd Debusmann Jr, Charlottesville: Why are the “Unite the Right” organisers on trial?, BBC (Oct. 27, 2021), https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-59054166.
139
Lisa Marie Segarra, Violent Clashes Turn Deadly in Charlottesville During White Nationalist Rally, Time (Aug. 12, 2017, at 18:56 ET), https://time.com/4898118/state-of-emergency-declared-as-violent-clashes-in-charlottesville-continue/.
140
A.C.Thompson, Police Stood By As Mayhem Mounted in Charlottesville, ProPublica (Aug. 12, 2017, at 23:00 EDT), https://www.propublica.org/article/police-stood-by-as-mayhem-mounted-in-charlottesville.
141
See generally Nicholas Evans, Conspiracy Theorists in Policing: Causes, Challenges, and Considerations, 19 J. of Policing, Intel. & Counter Terrorism 166 (2024) (describing police conspiracy theories, including those about the COVID-19 vaccine, amongst police in Australia and New Zealand).
142
Ali Breland, QAnon Is Attracting Cops, Mother Jones (Sept. 28, 2020), https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2020/09/police-officers-qanon/.
143
Will Carless, ‘Replacement theory’ fuels extremists and shooters. Now a top Border Patrol agent is spreading it, USA Today (May 15, 2022, at 15:46 ET), https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2022/05/06/great-replacement-theory-border-patrol-racist-talking-point/9560233002/.
144
Michael Feola, How ‘great replacement’ theory led to the Buffalo mass shooting, Wash. Post (May 25, 2022), https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/05/25/buffalo-race-war-invasion-violence/.
145
See Simon Clark, How White Supremacy Returned to Mainstream Politics, Ctr. for American Progress (2020), https://www.americanprogress.org/article/white-supremacy-returned-mainstream-politics/.
146
See id.; Maddy Crowell & Sylvia Varnham O’Regan, Extremist cops: how US law enforcement is failing to police itself, The Guardian (Dec. 13, 2019), https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/dec/13/how-us-law-enforcement-is-failing-to-police-itself?CMP=share_btn_tw.
147
See Josh Margolin, White supremacists ‘seek affiliation’ with law enforcement to further their goals, internal FBI report warns, abc News (Mar. 8, 2021), https://abcnews.go.com/US/white-supremacists-seek-affiliation-law-enforcement-goals-internal/story?id=76309051; FBI, (U) White Supremacist Infiltration of Law Enforcement 4-5 (2006), https://www.justsecurity.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Jan-6-Clearinghouse-FBI-Intelligence-Assessment-White-Supremacist-Infiltration-of-Law-Enforcement-Oct-17-2006-UNREDACTED.pdf.
148
See Margolin, supra note 149.
149
Id.; FBI, supra note 149.
150
Bob Buckley, Meet Officer Eudy, NC’s TikTok star, FOX 8 (May 6, 2022, at 18:54 EDT), https://myfox8.com/news/buckley-report/social-media-stars/meet-officer-eudy-ncs-tiktok-star/; Logan Mahan, The Cops of TikTok Aren’t Just Cringey — They’re Hugely Problematic, Inside Hook (Aug. 28, 2020, at 06:00 EDT), https://www.insidehook.com/article/internet/the-cops-of-tiktok-problematic.
151
Julia Harte & Alexandra Ulmer, U.S. police trainers with far-right ties are teaching hundreds of cops, Reuters (May 6, 2022, at 10:00 GMT), https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-police-extremism/.
152
See Madalyn Wasilczuk, Developing Police, 70 Buffalo L. Rev. 271 (2022) (discussing how police officers younger than 25 may be influenced by peers, not appreciate consequences of their actions, and be prone to act on impulse just like other emerging adults).
153
Id. at 325–28 (adding that these officers are more likely to be impulsive and not understand the consequences of their actions).
154
Id. at 308.
155
Gabriel J. Chin & Scott C. Wells, The “Blue Wall of Silence” as Evidence of Bias and Motive to Lie: A New Approach to Police Perjury, 59 U. Pitt. L. Rev. 233, 237 (1998).
156
See Friedman & Ponomarenko, supra note 57.
157
See Locurto v. Giuliani, 447 F.3d 159 (2d Cir. 2006).
158
Carol D. Leonnig & Aaron C. Davis, FBI resisted opening probe into Trump’s role in Jan. 6 for more than a year, Wash. Post (June 20, 2023), https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/2023/06/19/fbi-resisted-opening-probe-into-trumps-role-jan-6-more-than-year/.
159
Carol D. Leonnig et al., Showdown before the raid: FBI agents and prosecutors argued over Trump, Wash. Post (Mar. 1, 2023), https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/03/01/fbi-dispute-trump-mar-a-lago-raid/.
160
See generally Trump v. United States, 603 U.S. 593 (2024).
161
Anita Chabria, Anti-vaccine and alt-right groups team up to stoke fears of COVID-19 vaccine, L.A. Times (Dec. 18, 2020, at 09:00 PT), https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-12-18/anti-vaxxers-team-up-alt-right-against-covid-19-vaccine.
162
See Roudabeh Kishi & Sam Jones, Demonstrations and Political Violence in America: New Data for Summer 2020, ACLED (Sept. 3 2020), https://acleddata.com/report/demonstrations-and-political-violence-america-new-data-summer-2020; Andrew Blankstein et al., U.S. police chiefs grapple with new Election Day threat: Armed men at the polls, NBC News (Oct. 18, 2020), https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/u-s-police-chiefs-grapple-new-election-day-threat-armed-n1243826.
163
See Alana Wise, ‘Unconscionable’: Capitol Police Union Says Leadership Failed Officers in Riot, npr (Jan. 27, 2021), https://www.npr.org/sections/insurrection-at-the-capitol/2021/01/27/961268306/unconscionable-capitol-police-union-says-leadership-failed-officers-in-riot.
164
See Judy Woodruff & Frank Carlson, Home-grown extremism and lessons learned 28 years after Oklahoma City bombing, PBS (Apr. 19, 2023, at 18:35 EDT), https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/home-grown-extremism-and-lessons-learned-28-years-after-oklahoma-city-bombing.
165
Clyde Haberman, Memories of Waco Siege Continue to Fuel Far-Right Groups, N.Y. Times (July 12, 2015), https://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/13/us/memories-of-waco-siege-continue-to-fuel-far-right-groups.html.
166
See Jeff Asher & Ben Horwitz, How Do the Police Actually Spend Their Time?, N.Y. Times (Nov. 8, 2021), https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/19/upshot/unrest-police-time-violent-crime.html (pointing out how police devote the majority of their time not handling violent crime).
167
Shahar F. Aziz, State Sponsored Radicalization, 27 Mich. J. Race & L. 125, 126 (2021); Mark Hosenball & Sarah N. Lynch, FBI chief says U.S. “Antifa” demonstrators are targets of multiple probes, Reuters (Sept. 25, 2020), https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-security-threats/fbi-chief-says-u-s-antifa-demonstrators-are-targets-of-multiple-probes-idUSKCN26F3C2.
168
Tom Jackman, Police union says 140 officers injured in Capitol riot, Wash. Post (Jan. 27, 2021), https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/police-union-says-140-officers-injured-in-capitol-riot/2021/01/27/60743642-60e2-11eb-9430-e7c77b5b0297_story.html.
169
Press Release, U.S. Att’y’s Off., Dist. Of Minn., Self-Described Member of “Boogaloo Bois” Pleads Guilty to Riot (Sept. 30, 2021), https://www.justice.gov/usao-mn/pr/self-described-member-boogaloo-bois-pleads-guilty-riot.
170
See Olga R. Rodriguez, Ex-Air Force sergeant pleads guilty to killing federal guard, AP News (Feb. 11, 2022, at 19:47 EDT), https://apnews.com/article/us-air-force-oakland-san-francisco-police-shootings-1cbef4561cdc16baf12f29de32b06289.
171
See, e.g., William S. Parkin, Colleen E. Mills & Jeff Gruenewald, Far-Right Extremism’s Threat to Police Safety and the Organizational Legitimacy of Law Enforcement in the United States, 22 Criminology, Crim. Just., L. & Soc’y 1 (2021) (detailing internal and external threats to police officer safety from far-right extremist groups).
172
Id. at 3.
173
Id.
174
See Alec Tyson & Shiva Maniam, Behind Trump’s victory: Divisions by race, gender, education, Pew Research Ctr., (Nov. 9, 2016); Police who were polled for the 2016 election were overwhelmingly supportive of Donald Trump. See David Griffith, The 2016 POLICE Presidential Poll, Police Mag. (Sept. 2, 2016), https://www.policemag.com/patrol/article/15346665/the-2016-police-presidential-poll.
175
See Philip Bump, Police made a lot more reported contributions in 2020 than normal — mostly to Republicans, Wash. Post (Feb. 25, 2021), https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/02/25/police-made-lot-more-reported-contributions-2020-than-normal-mostly-republicans/.
176
Id.
177
Stoughton, supra note 53. .
178
Id. at 651.
179
Skolnick, supra note 13, at 223.
180
Id. at 224.
181
Ali Winston, The NYPD Brutalized Protestors in 2020. Will It Face a Reckoning?, N.Y. Mag. (Oct. 7, 2022), https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/10/the-nypd-beat-protesters-in-2020-will-there-be-a-reckoning.html.
182
Lois Beckett, US police three times as likely to use force against leftwing protestors, data finds, The Guardian (Jan. 14, 2021, at 13:00 EST), https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/13/us-police-use-of-force-protests-black-lives-matter-far-right.
183
Soldier, Police Officers In Trouble For Social Media Posts About Protests, CBS News (June 3, 2020, at 18:24 EDT), https://www.cbsnews.com/boston/news/national-guard-soldier-police-officers-social-media-george-floyd/.
184
Iman Said, Examining disparity in police behavior during the 2020 social and political protests, 63 Criminology 303 (2025).
185
Robert Klemko, She took on a small Mississippi town’s police. Then they arrested her, Wash. Post (July 3, 2024), https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2024/07/03/lexington-mississippi-police-justice-abuse-julian/.
186
A Martínez & Sacha Pfeiffer, Why progressive prosecutors face resistance from some police departments, NPR (Nov. 24, 2023, at 07:14 ET), https://www.npr.org/2023/11/24/1215057876/why-progressive-prosecutors-face-resistance-from-some-police-departments.
187
Stoughton, supra note 53 at 651.
188
See Monica C. Bell, Police Reform and the Dismantling of Legal Estrangement, 126 Yale L. J. 2054, 2117(2017).
189
See Danieli Evans, Carceral Socialization as Voter Suppression,28 Mich. J. Race & L. 39 (2023) (arguing that anti-democratic socialization through the carceral state may be a more powerful determinant of voting behavior than laws restricting voting).
190
See Id. at 60-61.
191
Restoration of Voting Rights for Felons, National Conference of State Legislatures, https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/felon-voting-rights (last updated June 6, 2024).
192
David Niven, Policing Polling Places in the United States: The Negative Effect of Police Presence on African American Turnout in an Alabama Election, Democracy and Security 18 (2), 170-183 (2021).
193
See Rocio Fabbro, Election Officials Combat Voter Intimidation Across U.S. as Extremist Groups Post Armed Militia at Some Polls, CNBC (Nov. 6, 2022, 7:00 AM), https://www.cnbc.com/2022/11/06/election-officials-facing-armed-militia-presence-at-some-polls.html.
194
See Bob Ortega, et al., Law Enforcement Ratchets Up Presence in Voting Process as Some Sheriffs Push Election Conspiracy Theories, CNN (Nov. 3, 2022, 10:02 PM), https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/03/politics/elections-law-enforcement-conspiracy-theories-invs/index.html.
195
Id.
196
See CNN Newsource, Some Law Enforcement Officials Are Policing Elections, CNN (Nov. 4, 2022, 9:52 AM), https://www.kktv.com/2022/11/04/some-law-enforcement-officials-are-policing-elections/.
197
Peter Eisler & Nathan Layne, Inside One Far-Right Sheriff’s Crusade to Prove Trump’s Bogus Voter-Fraud Claims, Reuters (July 29, 2022, 10:00 AM), https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-elections-michigan-investigation/.
198
“We’re gonna have sheriffs, and we’re gonna have law enforcement…” Zak Cheney-Rice, Trump’s Election-Day Gambit, Intelligencer (Aug. 21, 2020), https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/08/trump-vows-police-patrols-at-polling-sites-on-election-day.html.
199
Take Action, Protect America Now, https://web.archive.org/web/20210803213007/https://protectamericanow.com/take-action/.
200
Eisler & Layne, supra note 192.
201
Id.[/mfn The organization is, of course, pro-law enforcement and calls defund police movements and abolish ICE movements “radical”.²⁰¹Protect America Now, supra note 194.
202
See Jacqueline Francis & Madalyn Buursma, Barry Co. Sheriff, Others Could Face Charges for Taking Tabulators, WoodTV (Aug. 7, 2022, 8:22 PM), https://www.woodtv.com/news/barry-county/report-barry-co-sheriff-others-could-face-charges-for-taking-tabulators/.
203
Id.
204
Id.
205
Sydney Pereira, “Trump 2020”: Video Shows Police Endorsing Trump Over NYPD Loudspeaker on First Day of Early Voting in NYC, Gothamist (Oct. 25, 2020), https://gothamist.com/news/trump-2020-video-shows-police-endorsing-trump-over-nypd-loudspeaker-first-day-early-voting-nyc.
206
State, D.C., or Local Employee Hatch Act Information, U.S. Office of Special Counsel, https://osc.gov/Services/Pages/HatchAct-StateLocal.aspx#:~:text=%E2%80%8BThe%20Hatch%20Act%20restricts,by%20federal%20loans%20or%20grants.
207
Electioneering Prohibitions Near Polling Places, National Conference of State Legislatures, https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/electioneering-prohibitions (last updated Sep. 4, 2025).
208
Police Benevolent Association Breaks with Tradition, Endorses President Trump’s Re-Election Campaign, CBS News (Aug. 15, 2020, 11:30 PM), https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/nypd-police-benevolent-association-endorses-president-trump/.
209
About the Fraternal Order of Police, Fraternal Order of Police, https://fop.net/about-the-fop/.
210
Fraternal Order of Police Endorses Trump for President, Fraternal Order of Police, https://fop.net/2020/09/fraternal-order-of-police-endorses-trump-for-president/#:~:text=Washington%2C%20DC%20%2D%20National%20President%20Patrick,year’s%20election%2C%E2%80%9D%20Yoes%20said (last visited June, 24, 2024).
211
Linda So & Jason Szep, U.S. Election Workers Get Little Help from Law Enforcement as Terror Threats Mount, Reuters (Sept. 8, 2021, 10:00 AM), https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-election-threats-law-enforcement/.
212
Nat’L Conf. of State Legislators, Finding – and Keeping – Qualified Poll Workers 2023, https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/finding-and-keeping-qualified-poll-workers.
213
Erik Ortiz, Voter Intimidation Lawsuit Filed After Police Use Pepper-Spray at North Carolina March, NBC News (Nov. 3, 2020, 10:42 AM), https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/voter-intimidation-lawsuit-filed-after-police-use-pepper-spray-north-n1245944.
214
Id.
215
Alexandra Natapoff, Underenforcement, 75 Fordham L. Rev. 1715, 1719 (2006).
216
Id. at 1719.
217
Jason Wilson, Washington state: at least 20 county sheriffs refuse to enforce new gun laws, The Guardian (Feb. 22, 2019), https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/feb/22/washington-state-county-sheriffs-refuse-to-enforce-gun-laws.
218
Lloyd Lee, Sheriffs in the Colorado County Where the Club Q Shooting Took Place Have Refused to Enforce ‘Red Flag’ Laws and the County Declared Itself a ‘Second Amendment Preservation County’, Insider (Nov. 21, 2022, 7:47 PM), https://www.insider.com/colorado-county-sheriffs-red-flag-laws-club-q-mass-shooting-2022-11. 
219
Marlena Chertock, et al., ‘No’ Sheriff in Town: Some Lawmen Refuse to Enforce Federal Gun Laws, NBC News (Aug. 21, 2014, 12:01 AM), https://www.nbcnews.com/news/investigations/no-sheriff-town-some-lawmen-refuse-enforce-federal-gun-laws-n185426.
220
Mirya Holman & Emily Farris, Sheriffs Who See Themselves as Ultimate Defenders of the Constitution Are Especially Worried About Gun Rights, The Conversation (Jan. 30, 2023, 8:14 AM), https://theconversation.com/sheriffs-who-see-themselves-as-ultimate-defenders-of-the-constitution-are-especially-worried-about-gun-rights-198485.
221
Jesse McKinley & Cole Louison, Another Challenge to New York’s Gun Laws: Sheriffs Who Won’t Enforce the Law, New York Times, (October 9, 2022), https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/09/nyregion/ny-gun-law-sheriffs.html
222
Jason Wilson, Washington State: At Least 20 County Sheriffs Refuse to Enforce New Gun Laws, The Guardian (Feb. 22, 2019, 6:00 AM), https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/feb/22/washington-state-county-sheriffs-refuse-to-enforce-gun-laws.
223
See Holman, supra note 224.
224
Id.
225
226
See German, supra note 113.
227
State Fact Sheets, Georgetown Law, https://www.law.georgetown.edu/icap/our-work/addressing-the-rise-of-unlawful-private-militias/state-fact-sheets/.
228
Hampton Stall et al., Standing By: Right-Wing Militia Groups and the United States Election, ACLED (Oct. 22, 2020), https://acleddata.com/2020/10/21/standing-by-militias-election/.
229
See Erik Shechter, Kyle Rittenhouse and His Militia Defense Ignores that Private Paramilitaries are Illegal, NBC News (Sept. 5, 2020, 4:30AM), https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/kyle-rittenhouse-his-militia-defense-ignores-private-paramilitaries-are-illegal-ncna1239397.
230
Mary McCord, Lessons for Countering Domestic Terrorism Threat 20 Years after 9/11, 12, J. NATIONAL SECURITY L. POLICY, 161, 163 (2021).
231
See Kristine Phillips, Many Face Mask Mandates Go Unenforced as Police Feel Political, Economic Pressure, USA Today (Sept. 16, 2020, 1:17PM), https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2020/09/16/covid-19-face-mask-mandates-go-unenforced-police-under-pressure/5714736002/.
232
Andrew DeMillo, Some US Police Resist Enforcing Coronavirus Mask Mandates, PBS (July 26, 2020, 3:27PM), https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/some-us-police-resist-enforcing-coronavirus-mask-mandates.
233
Rachel Moran, Scofflaw Law Enforcement, 69 Wayne L. Rev. 31, 33-34 (2023).
234
Kiley Koscinski, Pittsburgh Police Resume Secondary Traffic Stops Despite City Ordinance Against Them, WESA (Jan. 12, 2023, 12:49PM), https://www.wesa.fm/politics-government/2023-01-12/pittsburgh-police-resume-secondary-traffic-stops-despite-city-ordinance-against-them.
235
Id.
236
Id.
237
See id.
238
See Jane B. Freidson, Police Officers Lie on Stand? You Don’t Say, N.Y. Times (May 6, 1994), https://www.nytimes.com/1994/05/06/opinion/l-police-officers-lie-on-stand-you-don-t-say-012556.html.
239
Joseph Goldstein, ‘Testilying’ by Police: A Stubborn Problem, N.Y. TIMES (Mar. 18, 2018), https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/18/nyregion/testilying-police-perjury-new-york.html.; See also Christopher Slobogin, Testilying: Police Perjury and What to Do About It, 67 U. COLO. L. REV. 1037 (1996).
240
“An investigation by The New York Times has found that on more than 25 occasions since January 2015, judges or prosecutors determined that a key aspect of a New York City police officer’s testimony was probably untrue. The Times identified these cases — many of which are sealed — through interviews with lawyers, police officers and current and former judges. . . The 25 cases identified by The Times are almost certainly only a fraction of those in which officers have come under suspicion for lying in the past three years. That’s because a vast majority of cases end in plea deals before an officer is ever required to take the witness stand in open court, meaning the possibility that an officer lied is seldom aired in public. And in the rare cases when an officer does testify in court — and a judge finds the testimony suspicious, leading to the dismissal of the case — the proceedings are often sealed afterward.” Goldstein, supra note 243.
241
Id.; See Lauren Leatherby & Richard A. Oppel Jr., Which Police Departments Are as Diverse as Their Communities, N.Y. Times (Sept. 23, 2020), https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/09/23/us/bureau-justice-statistics-race.html.
242
Katherine Schaeffer, Key Facts About Americans and Guns, Pew Research Center (July 24, 2024), https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2021/09/13/key-facts-about-americans-and-guns/.
243
White police live in cities when those cities are majority white. Grace Hauck & Mark Nichols, Should Police Officers be Required to Live in the Cities they Patrol? There’s no Evidence it Matters, USA TODAY (June 13, 2020, 4:00AM), https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/06/13/police-residency-data/5327640002/.
244
See Confronting the Demographics of Power, America’s Sheriffs, Reflective Democracy Campaign (June 2020), https://wholeads.us/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/reflectivedemocracy-americassheriffs-06.04.2020.pdf.
245
Id.
246
Id.
247
Id.
248
See Robert Orttung & Christopher Walker, Authoritarian Regimes Retool Their Media-Control Strategy, Wash. Post (Jan. 10, 2014, 7:50 PM), https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/authoritarian-regimes-retool-their-media-control-strategy/2014/01/10/5c5bfa6e-7886-11e3-af7f-13bf0e9965f6_story.html.
249
See Wendy Ruderman, Crime Report Manipulation is Common Among New York Police, Study Finds, N.Y. Times (June 28, 2012), https://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/29/nyregion/new-york-police-department-manipulates-crime-reports-study-finds.html.
250
See Carl Suddler, There’s Truth in Numbers in Policing – Until There Isn’t, Brookings (June 26, 2020), https://www.brookings.edu/blog/how-we-rise/2020/06/26/theres-truth-in-numbers-in-policing-until-there-isnt/.
251
See Office of Intelligence and Analysis Operations in Portland, U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security, at 56 (Apr. 20, 2021), https://www.wyden.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/I&A%20and%20OGC%20Portland%20Reports.pdf.
252
DHS describes itself as the nation’s largest law enforcement agency. See Law Enforcement, Office of Homeland Security Statistics, https://www.dhs.gov/ohss/topics/law-enforcement#:~:text=DHS%20is%20the%20largest%20federal,out%20of%20the%20United%20States.
253
Zolan Kanno-Youngs and Adam Goldman, Homeland Security Reassigns Official whose Office Complied Intelligence on Journalists, N.Y. Times (August 1, 2020), https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/01/us/politics/brian-murphy-homeland-security-protesters.html; The Lawfare Podcast, Why did DHS Compile an Intelligence Report on Lawfare’s editor in Chief?, LAWFARE (November 9, 2022) https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/lawfare-podcast-why-did-dhs-compile-intelligence-report-about-lawfares-editor-chief
254
See Zolan Kanno-Youngs & Nicholas Fandos, D.H.S. Downplayed Threats from Russia and White Supremacists, Whistle-Blower Says, N.Y. Times (Sept. 9, 2020), https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/09/us/politics/homeland-security-russia-trump.html.
255
Feola, supra note 146.
256
Kevin Roose, On Gab, an Extremist-Friendly Site, Pittsburgh Shooting Suspect Aired His Hatred in Full, N.Y. Times (Sept. 9, 2020), https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/28/us/gab-robert-bowers-pittsburgh-synagogue-shootings.html.
257
Lauren Villagran, Walmart Shooter Allegedly Penned White Supremacist Rant in ‘Bible of Evil’, El Paso Times (Aug. 4, 2019), https://www.elpasotimes.com/story/news/2019/08/04/el-paso-shooting-patrick-crusius-white-supremacist-manifesto/1914965001/.
258
Brenner M. Fissell, Police-Made Law, 108 Minn L. Rev. 2561 (2024).
259
Id. at 2635.
260
Id.
261
See Cami Mondeaux, DC Police Union Criticizes Criminal Code Overhaul and Warns of ‘Exploding’ Crime Rates, Washington Examiner (Jan. 18, 2023, 9:47 AM), https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/restoring-america/fairness-justice/dc-police-union-criticizes-criminal-code-overhaul.
262
@DCPoliceUnion, TWITTER (Apr. 11, 2023), https://twitter.com/DCPoliceUnion/status/1645910240381267969?s=20.
263
See @NatPoliceAssoc, Twitter (May 12, 2023, 11:13 PM), https://twitter.com/NatPoliceAssoc/status/1657237682580340736.
264
See @NatPoliceAssoc, Twitter (May 16, 2023, 2:36 PM), https://twitter.com/NatPoliceAssoc/status/1658557098555260930.
265
See @JackPosobiec, Twitter (May 14, 2023, 7:45 PM), https://twitter.com/JackPosobiec/status/1657909932254015489.
266
See Damali Ramirez, et al., How the Push and Pull of Unions is Hindering Police Reform Around the Country, USA Today, (Dec. 18, 2022, 6:00 AM), https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2022/12/18/police-reform-unions-role/10849108002/.
267
See, Angela J. Davis, Reimagining Prosecution: A Growing Progressive Movement, 3 UCLA CRIM. J. L. REV. 1, 16 (2019) (describing challenges for Larry Krasner from the FOP in Philadelphia); see also, Jeremy Kohler, Police Resistance and Politics Undercut the Authority of Prosecutors Trying to Reform the Justice System, PROPUBLICIA, https://www.propublica.org/article/police-politicians-undermined-reform-prosecutors-chicago-philadelphia(explaining how police unions and state government officials have called for the removal of various elected progressive prosecutors in various cities including Chicago, Atlanta and Philadelphia).
268
Akela Lacy, Prosecute a Cop? You’ll Face Removal from Office, The Intercept (Mar. 22, 2024), https://theintercept.com/2024/03/22/mary-moriarty-minnesota-reform-police-union-removal/.
269
Skolnick, supra, note 13 at 225.
270
Max Matza, Get out of Jail Free card: Will this card get you off a speeding ticket?, BBC (Jan. 23, 2018), https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-42780382; Katie Way, The Little Cards that Tell Police ‘Let’s Forget this Ever Happened’, Vice (Sept. 2, 2020), https://www.vice.com/en/article/v7gxa4/pba-card-police-courtesy-cards.
271
Id.
272
Id.
273
Christopher Ingraham, Three Quarters of Whites Don’t Have any Non-White Friends, Wash. Post (Aug. 25, 2014), https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/08/25/three-quarters-of-whites-dont-have-any-non-white-friends/; Press Release, PRRI, PRRI Survey: Friendship Networks of White Americans Continue to Be 90% White (May 24, 2022), https://www.prri.org/press-release/prri-survey-friendship-networks-of-white-americans-continue-to-be-90-white/.
274
See generally, Erin Carroll, A Free Press without Democracy, 56 U.C. Davis L. Rev. 289 (2022).
275
Id.
276
Marc Tracy & Rachel Abrams, Police Target Journalists as Trump Blames ‘Lamestream Media’ for Protests, N.Y. Times (June 1, 2020), https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/01/business/media/reporters-protests-george-floyd.html.
277
Id.
278
Id.
279
Benjamin Wittes, An Update on DHS Intelligence Reporting on Me, Lawfare (Nov. 8, 2022), https://www.lawfareblog.com/update-homeland-security-intelligence-reporting-me
280
Committee To Protect Journalists, Trump and the Media, April 16, 2020 https://cpj.org/reports/2020/04/trump-media-attacks-credibility-leaks/
281
About, U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, https://pressfreedomtracker.us/about/ (updated April 2024).
282
Id.
283
Incident Database, U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/. 
284
See Section I.
285
See Stoughton, supra note 53.
286
See Natapoff, supra note 57.
287
See nMoran, supra notes 21, 44.
288
Body-worn camera can be monitored almost instantly by AI products that currently exist. Jennifer A. Kingson, New AI tool instantly analyzes police bodycam footage, Axios (Jan. 30, 2023), https://www.axios.com/2023/01/30/police-tyre-nichols-bodycam-footage.
289
See also For Community Members, Truleo, https://truleo.co/for-communities.
290
White House Governance, Executive Order on Advancing Effective, Accountable Policing and Criminal Justice Practices to Enhance Public Trust and Public Safety, White House Briefing Room (May 25, 2022), https://web.archive.org/web/20220525215241/https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2022/05/25/executive-order-on-advancing-effective-accountable-policing-and-criminal-justice-practices-to-enhance-public-trust-and-public-safety/.
291
Heather Cherone, CPD Rejects Watchdog’s Demand to Reopen ‘Deficient’ Probe Into 8 Officers With Ties to Oath Keepers, wttw (July 9, 2024, 6:51PM), https://news.wttw.com/2024/07/09/cpd-rejects-watchdog-s-demand-reopen-deficient-probe-8-officers-ties-oath-keepers?utm_source=TMP-Newsletter&utm_campaign=8ee768aa77-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2024_07_11_10_58&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_5e02cdad9d-8ee768aa77-%5BLIST_EMAIL_ID%5D.
292
Id.
293
Id.
294
Press Release, CPD Declines to Reopen Deficient Investigation into Members’ Ties with Oath Keepers; Mayor’s Office Does Not Commit to Any Specific Action to Combat Extremism in Police Ranks, City of Chicago Office of Inspector General (July 9, 2024), https://igchicago.org/2024/07/09/cpd-declines-investigation-into-members-ties-with-oath-keepers/.
295
Id.
296
Parkin et al., supra note 172 at 11.
297
See Char Adams, Cities Vowed in 2020 to Cut Police Funding — but Budgets Expanded in 2021, NBC News (Dec. 28, 2021, 11:13 AM), https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/cities-vowed-2020-cut-police-funding-budgets-expanded-2021-rcna9864.
298
See note 41.
299
Dylan Matthews, How police unions became so powerful – and how they can be tamed, Vox (June 24, 2020), https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/21290981/police-union-contracts-minneapolis-reform.
300
Lauren Ouziel, Democracy, Bureaucracy and Criminal Justice Reform, 61 B.C. L. Rev. 523 (2020).
301
Id. at 532.
302
Justin Metz, Extremists in Uniform Put the Nation at Risk, N.Y. Times (Nov. 13, 2022), https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/13/opinion/us-police-military-extremism.html.
303
See German, supra note 113.
304
See Barry Friedman, Disaggregating the Police Function, 169 Penn L. Rev. 925 (2021) (describing police as having many different roles in our society, like crime fighters, mediator, social worker, traffic enforcement, etc.); V. Noah Gimbel & Craig Muhammad, Are Police Obsolete: Breaking Cycles of Violence through Abolition Democracy, 40 Cardozo L. Rev. 1453 (2019) (advocating for the creation of non-police institutions to supersede many current functions of the police.); Mary Fleck & Aaron Stagoff-Belfort, Reducing Policing’s Footprint? Racial Disparities and Arrest Trends After Misdemeanor Decriminalization and Legalization in Denver and Philadelphia, Vera Institute of Justice (May 2021), https://www.vera.org/downloads/publications/reducing-policings-footprint.pdf; Cynthia Lum, Perspectives on Policing: Cynthia Lum, Annual Review of Criminology 4(1), 19-25 (2021).
305
Maximo Langer, Penal Abolitionism and Criminal Law Minimalism: Here and There, Now and Then, 134 Harv. L. Rev. F. 42 (2020).
306
See note 42.
307
308
See Nicol Turner Lee & Caitlin Chin, Police Surveillance and Facial Recognition: Why Data Privacy is Imperative for Communities of Color, Brookings (Apr. 12, 2022), https://www.brookings.edu/research/police-surveillance-and-facial-recognition-why-data-privacy-is-an-imperative-for-communities-of-color/. [/mfn,] collection of our location through cell phone data³⁰⁸See Garance Burke & Jason Dearen, How an Obscure Cellphone Tracking Tool Provides Police ‘Mass Surveillance on a Budget’, PBS (Sept. 1, 2022), https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/how-an-obscure-cellphone-tracking-tool-provides-police-mass-surveillance-on-a-budget#:~:text=Geofence%20warrants%2C%20which%20tap%20into,can%20take%20days%20or%20weeks.
309
See Alfred Ng, License Plate Tracking for Police Set to Go Nationwide, CNET (Aug. 18, 2020), https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/license-plate-tracking-for-police-set-to-go-nationwide/.
310
See Paige St. John, DNA Genealogical Databases Are a Gold Mine for Police, but with Few Rules and Little Transparency, Los Angeles Times (Nov. 24, 2019, 5:00 AM), https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-11-24/law-enforcement-dna-crime-cases-privacy.
311
See notes 65, 119.
312
See Seth Stoughton, Principled Policing: Warrior Cops and Guardian Officers, 51, Wake Forest L. Rev. 611, 641-651 (2016) (describing the popularity of specialized weapons and trainings (SWAT) teams over the past several decades.); see also, Rashawn Ray, How 9/11 Helped to Militarize American Law Enforcement, Brookings (Sept. 9, 2021), https://www.brookings.edu/blog/how-we-rise/2021/09/09/how-9-11-helped-to-militarize-american-law-enforcement/.
313
See Kendall Godley, Police Investigating Police: Systemic Injustice Shields Officers from Accountability, 98 Denv. L. Rev. Forum 1 (2021).
314
Alabama Town Disbands Police Department After Officer’s Slavery Text Surfaces, USA Today (Aug. 8, 2022, 7:43 AM), https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2022/08/08/alabama-town-police-department-slavery-text/10263636002/; Scottie Andrew, This City Disbanded Its Police Department 7 Years Ago. Here’s What Happened Next, CNN (June 9, 2020, 11:23 PM), https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/09/us/disband-police-camden-new-jersey-trnd/index.html.

Volume IV

Democracy Undermined: Extremist Policing in America

Introduction

I. Democracy and the Role of Police

II. Law-enforcement and Far-Right Movements

A. Far-Right Extremism

B. Law Enforcement, Far-right Groups and Ideology

C. Reach of Extreme Police Views

D. Law Enforcement’s Blind Spot?

E. Violence by Police Towards Those That Threaten Them

III. Policing & Voting

IV. Law Enforcement’s Enforcement of Law

A. Laws Against Others

B. Abiding by the Law as Law Enforcement

V. Other Undemocratic Efforts by Police

A. Misinformation and Influence

B. Policing Lobby

C. Perks for friends

D. Police & the Press

Conclusion

References:

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