House Speaker Nancy Pelosi compared the police chokehold maneuver to “a lynching.”
The California Democrat made the comment during a Monday evening interview with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer as he asked her questions about a police reform bill that is currently being debated in Congress.
“Well, I think that — I can’t imagine they wouldn’t have a ban on chokeholds. Let’s get reasonable. Chokehold is a lynching. It’s a strangulation. It’s a lynching. I think that that is almost like the lowest common denominator,” she said after being asked if failing to include a chokehold ban in the legislation would be a deal breaker.
“People who have been so, so — just had such injustice in terms of policing in the lives of so many people in our country,” the speaker continued. “Let’s do the best we can, not the minimum that we can in this. This is about justice. It’s about redressing past grievances. It’s about, let’s see what we can do. I mean, chokeholds? Is there — am I missing something here? Perhaps I am, because what I heard the president say is, ‘Sometimes they’re OK.’ No, I don’t think so. I don’t think so.”
The measure proposed in the Democrat-controlled House bans chokeholds and no-knock warrants, creates a police reporting database, and prevents police officers from using qualified immunity to shield themselves from being held liable for their actions on the job.
Republicans, who are working on a police reform bill in the Senate, support the chokehold ban, and many GOP lawmakers support eliminating no-knock warrants, mandating the use of body cameras, and creating a national database to track deaths and injuries inflicted by police. However, many Republicans do not support changing qualified immunity for officers, and President Trump also opposes it.
Trump is expected to sign an executive order regarding policing on Tuesday.
