The Minnesota Board of Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST), which licenses the state’s law enforcement officers, approved rule changes on Thursday that included a ban on officers associating with or promoting the views of extremist and hate groups.
“Good work everybody,” said Mendota Heights Police Chief and chair of the board Kelly McCarthy, after the board voted unanimously to adopt the new rules. “This was four years in the making.”
The sweeping rule updates also featured changes to how officers are hired, and how the board can take action against officers’ licenses.
The move by the licensing board comes after a renewed sense of urgency following the murder of George Floyd by a then-Minneapolis Police officer in 2020. And while many applaud the decision as long overdue, more potential changes appear to be on the horizon.
The rule changes
Several state and local officials, along with activists and religious leaders, applauded the board’s efforts ahead of its approval of the draft rules in December. But a joint letter from the Minnesota Police and Peace Officer Association and Law Enforcement Labor Services expressed doubt about the board’s statutory authority to impose certain rules and the scope of the changes, as well as concerns about how the rule changes would affect local agencies’ ability to discipline their own officers.
Following the vote in December, the board convened on Thursday after administrative law judges issued an opinion last month mostly approving the changes.
Critics of the proposed rule change argued that the POST board doesn’t have the authority to limit the freedoms of speech and association of officers while off-duty. But the administration law judges disagreed, citing a 1995 decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, in which the panel found the discipline of a Little Rock Police officer who wore blackface to a Halloween party did not violate the officer’s constitutional rights of free speech.
“Because police departments function as paramilitary organizations charged with maintaining public safety and order, they are given more latitude in their decisions regarding discipline and personnel regulations than an ordinary government employer,” the opinion reads.
But the judges called the proposed rule barring officers from associating with white supremacist groups too vague, recommending that the board establish a definition of hate or extremist groups.
The definition would include groups that promote the use of threats, force, violence, or criminal activity against a local, state, or federal entity, or the officials of such an entity. Groups that deprive, or attempt to deprive, individuals of their civil rights under the Minnesota or United States Constitutions, or advocate for differences in the right to vote, speak, assemble, travel, or maintain citizenship based on a person’s perceived race, creed, religion, or any protected class as defined in Minnesota Statutes or federal law, would also be included.
McCarthy said in an interview that the recommendation by the judges is not her preferred language because one of the goals of the change was to single out white supremacy groups.
“The FBI has issued report after report saying right-wing extremists and white supremacy groups are actively trying to infiltrate law enforcement,” she said. “So we need to be honest about what we’re concerned about, and that is right wing extremism and white supremacy groups.”
But, she said, since all right-wing extremist groups are extremist groups by definition, she was fine with adopting the broadened recommendation.
“As long as we can address the behavior and the public can be assured that we are not going to allow any extremists in our ranks, I’m happy,” she said.
Among the rule changes was to the hiring process, which McCarthy said the board looked at through an equity lens. The use of past offenses like shoplifting or marijuana possession, which disproportionately prevented low-income Minnesotans and people of color from becoming peace officers, was removed from the evaluation process.
The requirement to be a U.S. citizen to become an officer was also changed to only needing to be legal to work in the U.S. due to the citizenship application process taking so long to complete.
Another significant change, in an effort to increase accountability, was to now allow the POST board to take action against an officer’s license based solely on misconduct, whereas the board could previously only take action following a criminal conviction.
“There’s a lot of ground between bad behavior and a conviction,” she said. “So now with these rules, the POST board will be able to initiate investigations based on behavior and not just on criminal convictions, just like the lawyers boards can and, quite frankly, the Board of Cosmetology.”
The rules could take effect as early as this spring pending approval from the chief administrative law judge and Gov. Tim Walz, the latter of whom appoints all members of the board. Shortly after the murder of George Floyd by a then-police officer in 2020, the Legislature moved to provide more spots on the board for citizens to represent the public.
Just the beginning
In addition to the vote by the POST board Thursday, more changes are potentially on the horizon.
In the Legislature, Sen. Clare Oumou Verbeten of St. Paul, vice chair of the Senate Judiciary and Public Safety Committee, introduced a pair of bills that would broaden the scope of the board’s authority.
One would require law enforcement agencies to conduct criminal background checks on prospective officers, and allow those agencies to share what they find with the board. The second bill would direct local officials to cooperate with the board in their investigation of a peace officer by providing public private and confidential data related to the officer while granting immunity to those local officials who comply.
For the POST Board, McCarthy said the changes made Thursday are only the beginning.
“This is just the first step — we’re doing all the rules, and this is just the first chunk of them,” she said. “We are looking at everything from reciprocity to testing, and as we move forward we’re going to look at what policies should be mandated and what policies that shouldn’t be mandated.
“There’s a lot of work ahead of us, but I think this was the biggest hurdle.”
Freedom of association is a violation of the 1st and 14th amendments. Punishment for group membership is only allowed when the government has proven that a person is actively affiliated with a group, knows of its illegal objectives, and has specific intent to further those objectives. I hope the board has plenty of insurance.
I think it would be hard for anyone to make the claim that they don’t know the Oath Keepers are an organized terrorist organization led by people who attempted to violently overthrow the government, including those convicted of insurrection. We could open it up further and just use the same standard cops like to use when determining whether a black person has any gang affiliation. That would basically include anyone still shameless enough to associate with the GOP and folks like Nick Fuentes.
Sadly, that claim is often made in the comments section here where people try to cast the oath keepers as the last true patriots in America. In reality, these self professed ‘patriots’ have a lot more in common with the seditionist confederates that lost the civil war, such that they’ve borrowed and glorified the symbols of those traitors.
Let’s just take a moment to note who it is around here that instinctively comes to the defense of Fascist on the police force. And let’s also note, that the same people who want to keep thugs in government uniforms are the same ones whining about being asked to wear masks or get vaccines, because you know… wearing a mask is soooooo much more oppressive than being beaten or killed.
It isn’t “punishment” to disqualify someone from licensure. You don’t have a constitutional right to be a police officer.
Would you be okay with an adherent of antifa becoming an officer? How about a member of BLM?
Do you think the board members should have qualified immunity?
Sounds like you should take that up with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit.
How would you try to reduce the presence of right wing hate group candidates from the police force? Clearly if they follow their political impulses when they deal with the public, and if their impulses are outside the generally accepted attitudes of prevailing societal norms, how do we proceed to keep people safe?
I’m not the least bit surprised that the objections rely entirely on questionable constitutional issues while studiously ignoring any discussion of the merits of the effort. I’d find it easier to give credibility to those against these rules if there was any sort of acknowledgement that not neo-Nazi or white supremacists on a police force was a worthy goal.
Can’t possibly be any more expensive than the massive serial payouts we have been making for decades to those whose rights and bodies are violated by our peace officers.
“ I hope the board has plenty of insurance.”
Pay me now or pay me later given the tens of millions of dollars awarded to the victims of racist warrior cops.
So it begins…
I wonder if or how this might affect the scenario in Golden Valley. Apparently several GV cops quit when the city council made changes regarding equity and racism in the GV police force. The cops who quit then went out and trash talked the GV police force discouraging others from joining the force, this has helped to keep GV understaffed. At the very least that sounds like conduct unbecoming.
Who gets to make the call what an “extremist orgranization”. I presume this is very subjective.
If we used the standards conservatives want law enforcement to use for gang affiliation. A part of that definition here for reference.
1. The person admits or asserts affiliation, membership or participation with a criminal gang.
2. The person participates in a criminal gang initiation, ritual or ceremony.
3. The person conspires to commit, or commits a crime for the benefit of the gang or over race, color, religion, sexual preference, national origin.
That would cover the Oath Keepers, 3-Percenters, and Proud Boys since all conspire or have conspired to overthrow the U.S. government by force. It’s how they define their entire “patriot” schtick. Those are, of course, just the most well know of the current right-wing terrorist organizations to be added to an already long list. The list shows why national law enforcement agencies say right-wing extremism is the largest threat to the country.
No wonder Tucker Carleson and Nick Fuentes want to talk about the border instead. They get to repeat the “America First” slogan shared by the GOP and most of their associated terrorist organizations while playing off conservatives’ long-held fear of outsiders.
I think you’ll find the criterion is well reported in this article. Seems pretty objective to me.
SO….we can have non-citizen cops . Do they have to know the laws or know how to speak English? Is this a race to the bottom?
Nice to see you are equating an attempt to disallow white-supremacists and those who openly support the idea of using violence to overthrow the government from being cops as a race to the bottom. I guess that clearly defines what you think the top would be.
You do know that police officers have to be trained and certified, right? That they have to show proof that they meet certain standards and that licensure is not automatic because one meets the minimum qualifications for applying?
Every 16-year-old in the state may apply for a driver’s license. That doesn’t mean they are allowed to drive.
Are ANTIFA and BLM extremist groups?
Have any of their leaders been convicted of sedition? Are they based on an idea that justifies and promotes violence (not civil disobedience, if you understand the difference) as legitimate if they don’t get their way politically? Do their members personify all 14 characteristics of fascisim? No. So no, they aren’t
Dan, not sure about “sedition” charges but pretty sure none burned down cities causing billions in damages.
No one with antifa or BLM ties has been convicted of sedition. You don’t like them, but that is not the same as sedition.
Is “burning down cities” part of the goals of either antifa or BLM? Being a member of a group that may include members who are guilty of a crime, or expressing support of an ideology that has adherents who may have committed a crime, is not by itself a disqualification.
Again, all of those thus far convicted in the MPLS riots have been white supremacists who were hoping to trigger another civil war, or race war. No ANTIFA, no Anarchists.
ANTIFA Is not even a group. That’s the funny thing about anarchists: not big on organizational structures, much less membership cards. Unlike the Proud Boys and Oath-keepers who revel in their toy soldier command structures.
They do if they meet the criterion spelled out in the article above, just like any other group.
It’s funny when right wingers show up asking the same questions as if they’ve never been asked or answered before, or as if there is no answer.
The Minnesota Police Licensing Board will decide who’s an extremists, and their definition of extremism is right here in the article. The United State of America is an anti-Fasicst nation, we actually fought a war over this. If you think an anti-Fascist is an extremist of some kind… you’re probably a Fascist. At any rate, while some ANTIFA or BLM supporters may be more radical than others, they’re not infiltrating law enforcement in order to subvert the US Constitution and tear up our democracy… the difference between the “Red Scare” and the KKK is/was the KKK actually had/has card carrying members in the government, and on the police force… and we’ve seen what happens.
Not to distract from the issue but another serious problem we have to address in law enforcement is the de facto deputization of right wing extremists by local law enforcement. When right wing militia groups show up with their military gear and assault weapons cops all around the country routinely welcome them and toss them bottled water rather than send them home. This is what happened in Wisconsin. Meanwhile, if these same cops saw what they THINK might be ANTIFA or Anarchist in military gear carrying assault weapons they’d call in SWAT teams to attack them.
There are some very fine comments on this page, but not from both sides. Its really pretty amazing to me that right out of the gate, someone found it necessary to defend Fascism. We live in very strange times. I wonder how much the WWII vets not talking about their fight against Fascism plays into so many of their progeny being willing to embrace it?
It is not coincidence that fascism is on the rise as the number of those who fought, or even lived, during WWII dwindles. A pandemic that killed nearly a million people over the age of 65 didn’t help, I’m sure.
All this psychobabble is irrelevant. It is what in somebodies brain and in their heart. How can you legislate that?
Um, because many white supremacists and fascists don’t simply keep it “in their brain and in their heart”? Because they freely and publicly proclaim their corrosive attitude, and act on it?
Get over this fascists and white supremacist’s comments. That is such a small, small percentage of the population. Even the cops that there has been problems with, how many have every shown a direct correlation to fascists of white supremacist’s groups? Almost none. Or maybe none.
Right-wing extremism is largely fascist and white-supremacist in nature and has been considered by national law enforcement the largest threat to this country for decades. It isn’t surprising that conservatives don’t like banning people associated with these terrorist organizations from being cops, given the overlap between those groups and “mainstream” conservatives. It isn’t like conservatives are shy about integrating white supremacy ideas into their communication and platform. America First, Replacement Theory, Confederate flags, Make America Great Again (when was that exactly?), gun fetishism, etc., are all the driving factors behind conservative beliefs. They are used across all conservative groups, whether they are from overt terrorists like the Oath Keepers, their advocates like Nick Fuentes, or on their most popular television programs like Tucker.
“That is such a small, small percentage of the population. ”
That is a percentage of the population that should not be licensed as law enforcement.
Get over Fascism? Dude… we’ll get over it when you admit the fascist president lost the election, as long as fascists keep trying to get him back into the White House… this is going to be an issue. Last I heard, MN Republicans (not a small number of people by the way) are still claiming the election was rigged or stolen somehow and are trying to figure out how to steal the next one.
You observe their behavior and make a decision on fitness for a job based on stated guidelines.
No one’s even trying to legislate hearts and minds, it’s a free country, you can have what you have in your heart and mind… but we exercise some care and common sense when we hand out badges and a license to kill.
Hindsight is always 20/20. If we would use care and common sense, we wouldn’t have a need for jails and prisons in the first place.
“If men were angels, no government would be necessary.”
It’s funny when “conservatives” who are supposed to be the guardians of tradition and historical lessons argue that hindsight is irrelevant. We don’t need hindsight to know what happens when Fascist take over governments and KKK members get badges and a license to kill… the outcome is quite predictable, and has been predicted.
So, somehow the licensing board is going to weed out fascists and KKK members? What do they look like? Is there a checkbox on the application?
Why are you insisting on being willfully ignorant?