This month, the Dept. of Justice released a report titled, The President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing.

It contains multiple issues, but also persistent theme of keeping local law enforcement from actually enforcing some laws; specifically, immigration laws.

Key quotes:

“It is the view of this task force that whenever possible, state and local law enforcement should not be involved in immigration enforcement.”

“The U.S. Department of Homeland Security should terminate the use of the state and local criminal justice system, including through detention, notification, and transfer requests, to enforce civil immigration laws against civil and nonserious criminal offenders.”

“The U.S. Department of Justice should not include civil immigration information in the FBI’s National Crime Information Center database.”

Another interesting quote:

“Law enforcement agencies should establish search and seizure procedures related to LGBTQ and transgender populations…”

Um… Ok — so a special set of laws for some people?

Who Are The Players
In the beginning of the report, there is a list who is involved in the task force.

The Co-Chairs are Charles Ramsey, Commissioner, Philadelphia Police Department and Laurie Robinson, Professor, George Mason University.

One would assume this task force would be filled with law enforcement types. That would be an incorrect assumption.

The other members are below:

• Cedric L. Alexander, Deputy Chief Operating Officer for Public Safety, DeKalb County
• Georgia Jose Lopez, Lead Organizer, Make the Road New York
• Tracey L. Meares, Walton Hale Hamilton Professor of Law, Yale Law School
• Brittany N. Packnett, Executive Director, Teach For America, St. Louis, Missouri
• Susan Lee Rahr, Executive Director, Washington State Criminal Justice Training Commission
• Constance Rice, Co-Director, Advancement Project
• Sean Michael Smoot, Director and Chief Counsel, Police Benevolent & Protective Association of Illinois
• Bryan Stevenson, Founder and Executive Director, Equal Justice Initiative
• Roberto Villaseñor, Chief of Police, Tucson Police Department

Teach for America??

What in the world is a Teach for America person like Packnett doing on a task force for policing??

Here’s why Packnett is there:

On the day of Brown’s shooting, Brittany Packnett, 30, the executive director of Teach For America in St. Louis, said she was giving her usual speech at a girl’s empowerment conference in Kansas City. But as she watched anger unfold in Ferguson — with young women and girls on the scene — Packnett realized that “telling girls to be leaders tomorrow wasn’t good enough — they needed to be leaders now.”

And so did she, Packnett said. Like Blackmon, she was appointed to the Ferguson Commission.
– LA Times, ‘Women find their voice in Ferguson protest movement’

And:

“Working with the President of the United States of America is a critical step, but work must continue across the movement for us to secure justice for our children of today and tomorrow,” said Brittany Packnett, a St. Louis educator and activist.
– FergusonAction.com

And here, Packnett ties policing to our schools:

Problems of police brutality and racial profiling are closely tied to ongoing crises of education, health care and unemployment in the African-American community, says Brittany Packnett, executive director of Teach For America-St. Louis and a member of Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon’s Ferguson Commission.

“‘Ferguson has laid bare many systematic injustices that are present in urban communities of color and in suburbs,” she said. “Across the country, we know that low income people and people of color suffer disproportionately from certain injustices and that most of those injustices are highly interconnected.”
–USA Today, Ferguson has become a springboard for many movements

The USA today article goes on to describe the Black Lives Matter campaign as being part of the “Occupy Wall Street Effect”.

It’s been noted in the past that Teach for America is more a political organization than teacher organization.  Having said that, I submit that the purpose of Teach for America is not to create a teacher workforce, but instead to use state and government funds to direct political agenda items from the top down.  This task force is a prime example.

Skeptical? Don’t miss the picture on page 80 of the report.

Flashback:  Black Lives Matter protests in Durham, NC at which Teach for America employees were integral part. A Teach for America worker bailed out the arrestees to the tune of an estimated $36,000.  WHERE DID THE BAIL MONEY COME FROM?