The Trump administration moved on Wednesday to scrap proposed agreements for federal oversight of police departments in Minneapolis and Louisville, Ky. The action was part of a broader abandonment of efforts to overhaul local law enforcement agencies accused of civil rights violations and other abuses.
Justice Department officials said they planned to drop cases filed after incidents of police violence against Black people in the two cities. They will also close civil rights investigations into departments in Memphis; Phoenix; Oklahoma City; Trenton, N.J.; and Mount Vernon, N.Y., as well as a case against the Louisiana State Police.
Officials are also reviewing federal oversight arrangements that are already in place with about a dozen other cities to determine if they should be abandoned, said Harmeet K. Dhillon, the head of the Justice Department’s civil rights division. “I would get rid of some of them today if I could,” she told reporters.
Police departments in Baltimore, Newark, Ferguson, Mo., and several other cities remain under some federal oversight.
The administration’s announcement came four days before the fifth anniversary of the murder of George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man who died at the hands of the Minneapolis police. His death, caught on video, inspired national outrage and worldwide protests against police violence targeting Black people.
It also resulted in a withering federal report that found that the Minneapolis police routinely discriminated against Black and Native American people and used deadly force without justification. After nearly two years of negotiations, the Justice Department and the city submitted a court agreement in January calling for federal oversight of the Police Department’s efforts to address the issues.
That arrangement, known as a consent decree, was similar to court-approved agreements with at least 13 other cities whose police forces have been accused of civil rights abuses. The decrees set requirements for how officers should be trained and disciplined, with an outside monitor and a judge to ensure compliance, sometimes for years.
Ms. Dhillon called consent decrees a tool that “have been used badly” against police departments, arguing that they cost too much and last too long. But she told reporters that the Trump administration might decide to use that same legal tool against universities and school systems accused of failing to stamp out on-campus antisemitism.
The administration has already begun two of its own investigations that could lead to new consent decrees. Those involve examining whether gun ownership rights are too restricted in Los Angeles County, and whether Black defendants in Minnesota’s largest county are given an unfair advantage for reduced prison sentences.
The department’s arrangement with Minneapolis had yet to take effect, and the consent decree with Louisville was also awaiting a judge’s approval. The Police Department there was investigated after the killing of Breonna Taylor, a 26-year-old medical worker who was shot in 2020 during the botched execution of a search warrant.
Leaders in Minneapolis and Louisville had been expecting the Trump administration’s actions, which are sure to be met with consternation by leaders of the movement for racial justice that the murder of Mr. Floyd intensified. The anniversary of his death is expected to be observed in Minneapolis this weekend with remembrances and vigils.
Ms. Dhillon said the timing of Wednesday’s announcement was not related to the anniversary, but to looming court deadlines this week in both the Minneapolis and Louisville cases.
Officials in Minneapolis have said that they would go ahead with the overhaul measures promised in the agreement, even without federal oversight. Since 2023, the city has also been party to a separate court-enforced agreement with the state of Minnesota to address race-based policing.
Still, proponents of consent decrees say that nothing works quite as well as federal oversight has. The agreements have been among the federal government’s most potent tools for overhauling law enforcement agencies that have been accused of civil rights abuses, experts say, and can result in lasting change.
Despite that, some cities, including Memphis and Phoenix, have resisted entering into such agreements, even after scathing Justice Department reports detailed histories of abuses and misconduct. Officials in those cities have said they could fix problems on their own, without federal oversight.
“On the one hand, consent decrees can be onerous, bureaucratic and costly,” said Chuck Wexler, the executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum, a research group in Washington. “And on the other hand, the irony is that cities that most need help to update their policies and training would not get the resources without the federal consent decree.”
He added that the agreements had enabled police chiefs in several cities to access federal money for policy updates and additional training.
Federal oversight of state and local police departments began during the Clinton administration, when legislation was passed in response to the beating of Rodney King by the Los Angeles police in 1991. But support for oversight has seesawed depending on which party has held the White House.
Several major cities negotiated consent decrees with the Obama administration, prompted in part by widespread protests over police killings of unarmed Black people. The agreements called on officers to form partnerships with community groups in Ferguson, receive training on de-escalation tactics in Baltimore and work to develop unbiased policing policies in Cleveland.
The first Trump administration limited the use of consent decrees, but those restrictions were rescinded under the Biden administration. On the campaign trail last year, Mr. Trump repeatedly said that he wanted to give officers “immunity from prosecution, so they’re not prosecuted for doing their job.”
Mr. Trump paved the way for Wednesday’s announcement last month, when he signed an executive order directing Attorney General Pam Bondi to review all federal consent decrees and to “modify, rescind or move to conclude” them within 60 days.
Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis has said that his city remains committed to major changes that the Police Department adopted after Mr. Floyd’s murder. Those reforms include policies seeking to limit the use of force, improve training and restore residents’ trust.
“We will implement every reform outlined in the consent decree,” he said in a statement, “because accountability isn’t optional.”
Shaila Dewan contributed reporting.
Jacey Fortin covers a wide range of subjects for The Times, including extreme weather, court cases and state politics across the country.
Devlin Barrett covers the Justice Department and the F.B.I. for The Times.
Ernesto Londoño is a Times reporter based in Minnesota, covering news in the Midwest and drug use and counternarcotics policy.
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