Source: Politics<\/p>\n
KENOSHA \u2014 There are no Twitter rants. No threats of calling in tanks to break up violent protests. No warnings that \u201dwhen the looting starts, the shooting starts<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n As two high-profile, emotionally charged trials \u2014 that of Kenosha, Wisc., shooter Kyle Rittenhouse and three men convicted of the murder of Ahmaud Arbery \u2014 came to their dramatic conclusions in recent weeks, President Joe Biden has in every way attempted to be the anti-Donald Trump. <\/p>\n He has kept a low profile, working behind the scenes to keep the peace both on the streets of America \u2014 where there have been limited protests <\/a>\u2014 and within the realm of his party. <\/p>\n Ahead of the Rittenhouse verdict, the president was in touch with Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers to discuss safety measures in Kenosha. He called law enforcement groups in recent months to gauge their frustrations, according to a person with direct knowledge of the conversations. And last week \u2014 as the Rittenhouse jury deliberated \u2014 he signed three bills that boosted benefits<\/a> for local and federal law enforcement, while his Justice Department released $139 million to fund more police officers across the country. At the same time, a division within the DOJ has been working with local community groups to train leaders on de-escalation techniques. <\/p>\n That\u2019s a stark contrast with the fulsome embrace of Rittenhouse on the right, punctuated by the 18-year-old\u2019s lengthy interview with Fox News host Tucker Carlson and a visit with Trump<\/a> at Mar-a-Lago. But, for Biden, the effort to lower the temperature carries its own set of risks, namely leaving voters on both ends of the political spectrum wanting more from him. <\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s had to tailor his positions to reflect the deeply held beliefs and aspirations and hopes for all people on the left, on the right and in the middle. And oftentimes when you do that, other people on the left or the right or the middle \u2014 sometimes all of them \u2014 will feel like the president isn’t giving us everything we need or everything that we work for,\u201d said Jim Pasco, executive director of the National Fraternal Order of Police. \u201cWhat he’s trying to do is give everybody the best that they can get in a united country.\u201d<\/p>\n Biden has long rejected calls from the left wing of his own party to \u201cdefund the police\u201d and vowed during the 2020 presidential campaign that he would instead invest more money in police departments. Amid a spike in violent crime in major cities around the country over the past year, he\u2019s signaled to law enforcement that he has their backs. At the same time, he\u2019s promised civil rights advocates and other progressives that he will pursue substantive police reform. He has also spoken out against vigilante justice, as Rittenhouse\u2019s actions were characterized when he shot three people, killing two, amid violent confrontations after last year\u2019s racial justice protests in Kenosha. <\/p>\n But Rittenhouse was found to have acted in self-defense by the jury considering his cases. And Biden\u2019s administration has so far fallen short in pushing police reform through Congress, where sweeping bipartisan legislation stalled. <\/p>\n The left is growing impatient. The breakdown of the negotiations in Congress has only added to their frustration with inaction, increasing calls to change the filibuster. While the White House has said the president plans to sign executive orders to target law enforcement overreach, those would only apply to federal law enforcement, which makes up approximately 5 percent of the overall policing workforce in the country, according to Pasco. <\/p>\n Cliff Albright, co-founder of Black Voters Matter, said Biden is \u201cdefinitely not moving fast enough. Not only in terms of legislation but also regarding executive actions he could be taking.\u201d <\/p>\n Though Albright ultimately said the GOP is at fault because they were \u201cnever serious about passing such legislation,\u201d he said police reform is \u201cdefinitely taking a back seat to [Biden\u2019s] economic agenda.\u201d <\/p>\n Civil rights advocates say they\u2019re still pushing the administration to stay focused on measures to reform law enforcement practices, citing continued excessive force allegations against police. <\/p>\n \u201cWe are focused on supporting the DOJ Civil Rights Divisions \u2014 for these issues it is action plus words that count, and we see a newly assertive DOJ that takes its role seriously \u2014 unlike the misfeasance and neglect of the prior DOJ, which failed in its duties spectacularly,\u201d said Marc Morial, president of the National Urban League. <\/p>\n Their sense of urgency was echoed in the left\u2019s reactions to the Rittenhouse and Arbery verdicts.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat we are witnessing is a system functioning as designed and protecting those it was designed for,\u201d Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) tweeted after Rittenhouse was acquitted of all charges. <\/p>\n \u201cOur justice system is broken. It protects white supremacy,\u201d Rep. Rashida Tlaib<\/a> added on Twitter following the Rittenhouse verdict. \u201cThe two people who were killed deserved justice and so did our communities who continue be targeted with violence like this.\u201d<\/p>\n Biden, on the other hand, opted for an understated approach to the news that Rittenhouse had been cleared in the shooting deaths of two people, saying he accepted the jury\u2019s verdict. Later that day in a statement, however, he added that the verdict in Kenosha \u201cwill leave many Americans feeling angry and concerned, myself included.\u201d But, he reiterated, \u201cwe must acknowledge that the jury has spoken.\u201d<\/p>\n After guilty verdicts were rendered against the three men accused of killing Arbery, Biden released a similarly calm, if somber, statement calling the killing \u201ca devastating reminder of how far we have to go in the fight for racial justice in this country.\u201d He made only a vague reference to how his administration would tackle reforms in the criminal justice system, saying it would \u201ccontinue to do the hard work to ensure that equal justice under law is not just a phrase emblazoned in stone above the Supreme Court, but a reality for all Americans.\u201d <\/p>\n Biden\u2019s Justice Department has taken a similarly reserved approach. It concluded<\/a> it would not level charges against police involved in the 2020 shooting of Jacob Blake, a Black man who was left paralyzed after a white officer shot him as Blake attempted to flee, sparking the Kenosha protests that drew Rittenhouse and others to the city. The shooting came shortly after the murder of George Floyd, an unarmed Black man, by a white policeman in Minneapolis, Minn. On the campaign trail Biden declared that officers \u201cat a minimum\u201d should face charges. He also linked Rittenhouse to white supremacists<\/a> during the presidential campaign.<\/p>\n The mixture of violence and racial tension ultimately became the focus of the 2020 presidential race for much of the summer, with both Trump and Biden visiting Wisconsin after the Blake shooting and the deadly protest at which Rittenhouse killed two people. <\/p>\n But things have changed dramatically since then. Last week after the Rittenhouse verdict, Kenosha remained quiet. While some demonstrators stood on the courthouse steps holding signs and keeping a vigil as the trial went on, their protests did not turn violent. <\/p>\n \u201cPresident Biden ran on a promise to lower the temperature in our politics and bring Americans together,\u201d White House spokesperson Mike Gwin said. \u201cWe know there\u2019s still much more work to be done, but in ways large and small the President has helped us begin to turn the page on the hateful, divisive, rhetoric we saw emanate from the previous White House and poison our country.”<\/p>\n