[Congressional Record Volume 162, Number 114 (Thursday, July 14, 2016)]
[House]
[Pages H4999-H5002]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        GUN VIOLENCE IN AMERICA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 6, 2015, the Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from California 
(Ms. Maxine Waters) for 30 minutes.

[[Page H5000]]

  

  Ms. MAXINE WATERS of California. Mr. Speaker, I take the floor this 
afternoon to continue to talk about gun violence and to talk about the 
problems that we are encountering in this country at this time with the 
issues of citizens being killed, police officers being killed, domestic 
violence, to talk about people who may be mentally ill who are 
committing gun violence.
  This is a very difficult subject. You have heard from my colleagues 
for some days now about our determination to deal with this issue of 
gun violence. You have heard about the bills that we have tried to get 
taken up on the floor to deal with gun violence. Very simple bills. One 
bill that is a bill that has been characterized as no fly, no buy, 
simply meaning that if you are too dangerous to be on an airplane, you 
are too dangerous to be able to buy a gun. And, of course, universal 
background checks to make sure we know who is seeking to purchase 
weapons and what their backgrounds are and whether or not they should 
be allowed to purchase a gun.
  In the middle of all of this work that we are doing, we are painfully 
reminded that there is another issue and another problem that we have 
been confronted with year in and year out that really has not been 
dealt with, and this problem is one that has reared its head one more 
time.
  Just a few days ago we witnessed the killings of Alton Sterling in 
Baton Rouge and Philando Castile in Minnesota. And, of course, because 
of the graphic pictures that were shown on television, because of the 
cell phones that recorded what was going on, it has really created the 
kind of discussion and organizing and rallying and protesting that 
forces us to have to deal with this issue even when it is too painful 
for many to deal with.
  I would like to say that I have been dealing with this issue for 
many, many years. It started when I was in the California State 
legislature back in 1994. There was a woman named Eula Love, who was 
shot down on her porch in front of her daughters. Because she had not 
been able to pay her utility bill, her gas bill, her heating bill, and 
because she would not allow the gas company to turn off her heat, they 
called the police, and the police came out. A confrontation ensued. I 
think she had a butter knife that she waved at them, and they shot Eula 
Love down on her porch.
  I became very active back then in dealing with police shootings 
because, as you know, in the Los Angeles area there had been incidents 
prior to this, dating back before this that had created the kind of 
protests and rallies that really caused people to fear what was 
happening in our communities. So I organized. I visited the police 
commission. I organized others to visit the police commission. We tried 
to set up meetings with the police chief at the time, who was Daryl 
Gates.
  Daryl Gates was a tough chief of police, and he had no intentions of 
sitting down with the community to talk about police shootings. He felt 
that every police shooting was justified and that the community had no 
right to question what happened when there was a confrontation between 
police and the community.
  We organized. We continued to put pressure on Daryl Gates. More 
incidents occurred. As a matter of fact, when you heard about the death 
of Eric Gardner up in New York, who died from something called the 
choke hold, it really was a practice that was used in the Los Angeles 
area by police officers. At that time, Daryl Gates, the police chief, 
said that the Black people who were killed as a result of the choke 
hold died because something was wrong with their carotid muscle; that 
it was something abnormal about Black people that caused them to die 
when they were placed in this kind of choke hold.
  And so having worked in the greater Los Angeles area and witnessed 
Police Chief Daryl Gates learning and understanding the choke hold, and 
even there was something called the battering ram and on and on and on, 
I have known for many years that this was an issue that had to be dealt 
with, and from time to time others have tried.
  There have been meetings in various cities and towns in this country 
at police commissions. Many people have tried to create civilian police 
review boards. It has been resisted in many cities and towns. Very few 
have been able to create citizen police review boards.
  So these killings continue. And they are disproportionately killings 
of Black men and boys. So when people raise the question about why so 
many Black folks are involved in this issue, it is because of the 
disproportionate number of African Americans who find themselves 
killed, and their families find their relatives killed at the hands of 
police.
  Now, of course, not all police are out looking to kill someone. Not 
all police are prejudiced. Not all police are bad officers. But, of 
course, we know there are problems. We have pointed to the training, 
and we have asked for better training. We have always felt that the 
buck stops at the top and that if police chiefs have the kind of 
training that we believe officers should have, we could reduce the 
numbers of confrontations and killings of young Black men in 
particular.
  I don't know what has become of this training idea. I think most 
police chiefs will tell you: Oh, we do the proper training. We have the 
best training of any police department in the country.
  But somehow people who are the victims of police officers who are 
responsible for these killings really don't believe that the training 
is what it should be.
  These killings are creating the kind of protests and rallies that are 
making a lot of people extremely uncomfortable. We are all very 
saddened by the fact that we lost five police officers in Dallas and 
that the killer of the police officers said he killed them because he 
was seeking revenge. We do not want the revenge mentality to take hold 
in this country. That is very dangerous.
  What do we do about it?
  What we do about it is keep working at how we can reduce these 
killings, how we can eliminate these killings.
  What can we do?
  I have some ideas about this that I am working with some people on. 
As a matter of fact, I will be speaking to the National Black Lawyers 
Association on Monday in St. Louis, Missouri, and I am going to talk 
with them about several ideas.
  One of the ideas I want to talk with them about is encouraging more 
communities to meet on an ongoing and regular basis with police chiefs. 
Get to know them, talk with them, explain what has been said about them 
and the feelings of African Americans in these communities. Get to know 
each other.
  I am going to ask them to work with the members of the city councils 
who have the budgets of the police departments and with the county 
supervisors who have the budgets of the sheriff's departments. Talk 
with them and leverage your influence because you have the budget in 
your control to let them know how serious you are about reducing these 
killings and these confrontations.
  The other issue that I am going to talk with the lawyers about is 
putting together a program to take to our police chiefs about reducing 
the confrontations by eliminating stopping these automobiles and these 
drivers on minor incidents, minor problems.
  Of course, there are going to be some taillights that need to be 
fixed, but do you need to stop that motorist? Do you need to ask them 
to get out of the car? Do you need to ask them to get out of the car 
with their hands up? Do you ask them to get out of the car and lean 
over the back of the car, legs spread, arms spread? Do you need to ask 
them to get out of the car and tell them to lay on the ground while you 
search them? Do you need to search the car illegally? What are you 
looking for?

                              {time}  1815

  If, in fact, it is just a tail light, can't you just give a warning? 
Can't you just give a ticket and go on about your business? Why is it 
that these police stops about tail lights and other infractions are 
causing so much confrontation?
  Of course, as most drivers try to do the best they can in driving and 
taking care of their cars, I am sure there are those who would like to 
get some things fixed, whether it is a windshield wiper or a tail light 
or something else that may be wrong with the car, but I am sure some 
may have to wait until the next payday. They may not have enough money 
to do that. They are not

[[Page H5001]]

crooks and they are not criminals, and they should be warned.
  There is something in the Black community that Blacks have believed 
for a long time. When kids are coming up, they tend to get in trouble. 
Sometimes they vandalize; sometimes they perhaps ring somebody's 
doorbell and run, as someone was explaining the other night that was 
happening with their child; or sometimes they will pull a prank and run 
away, and then they get caught.
  In the African American community, we believe that oftentimes when 
children commit these kinds of minor offenses and the police stop them, 
they take them home to momma or they tell them to get out of there and 
go home, but when Black kids are stopped, the Black community believes 
our kids are taken to jail.
  We have got to straighten out some of the misunderstandings about 
what happens when Black boys, in particular, and Black men are stopped 
on these infractions. We believe that a lot of confrontations do not 
have to take place if, in fact, these minor offenses are not treated 
like crimes.
  We believe that we can reduce the occurrence of these confrontations 
by convincing the police departments that they should not be asking 
folks to get out of their cars and creating a confrontation.
  People should not be calling each other names. We want to eliminate 
from the mouths of any police officers the N-word or the kind of 
language that is oftentimes used when they decide that they are going 
to stop someone and that they are going to raise questions or they are 
going to search them, et cetera. We believe that that is a legitimate 
thing to do.
  So I am going to be recommending to the National Black Lawyers 
Association that we put together a program that we present to these 
police chiefs and these police departments about reducing confrontation 
and discontinuing the stops on minor offenses that end up in 
confrontations and killings.
  The other thing that I am going to be recommending not only to the 
National Black Lawyers Association but to the news media and to these 
channels who cover all of this, why can't we have some public service 
announcements that go on every day and maybe at the end of every day 
where people are reminded about safe driving and taking care of their 
cars, getting those windshield wipers fixed, getting those tail lights 
fixed, making sure that the windows are working.
  Why can't we have public service announcements that just keep 
reminding people to have your insurance documentation in the car with 
you--all of those things that could reduce the kind of stops that we 
are witnessing time and time again that are ending in confrontation. I 
believe that there are many other things that we can do if we think 
about it.
  I know there is a lot going on about having discussions. People say 
that we should talk to each other more. Well, that is fine and that is 
good, and for all of those people who would like to be involved in 
discussions with each other in their communities or with the police 
department, you should do that.
  But talk is cheap, and it really is going to take some concerted 
actions to be able to deal with this problem.
  There are some police officers who should just be weeded out. They 
have no business being police officers. They are either trigger-happy 
or they are prejudiced. And when they see a young Black man, six-foot-
two, six-foot-three, weighing 200 pounds, they are automatically afraid 
of them, and they think that they have to protect themselves against 
them simply because of the size of the individual.
  When we take a look at Eric Gardner up in New York, who was of such 
size, where he was wrestled to the ground simply because he was selling 
loose cigarettes, that was all about, we believe, some officer proving 
that they were not afraid of him and they could take him to the ground 
and they could deal with him. Of course, it is what triggered his 
death. There was no need to tackle him.
  I just saw on television the other day a famous, I believe, tennis 
player who was standing in New York and was rushed by police because 
they said he fit the description of someone who had been reported who 
had committed a crime.
  Now, when you say that you stopped a young Black man because they fit 
the description, nobody believes that. We have heard that over and over 
and over again. And Blacks believe that that is an excuse to stop 
somebody, and it is a convenient excuse to say, ``Well, we stopped him 
because he fit the description.''
  They don't have any other reason to stop. They have not violated 
anything, they don't have traffic warrants, et cetera, et cetera. But 
this excuse has been used over and over again: He fit the description, 
and that is why we stopped.
  When people are the victims of those who say they fit the 
description, of course they are angry. Of course they are going to tell 
the police officer that they didn't fit the description and they don't 
like this happening. And that causes another kind of confrontation.
  So we need to be able to talk with the police chiefs and tell them 
these kinds of things.
  And we need to get rid of that culture of silence in the police 
department. One officer can witness another officer actually committing 
a crime, he could see that police officer targeting and treating 
somebody bad, but they will never, ever admit it. They will never, ever 
report it. That culture of silence and protection is something that we 
all know about, and it happens every day.
  So we need to be honest about what the feelings are, and the police 
need to be honest with us about what they think about what they are 
doing in these kinds of situations.
  Even in all that I have heard on television in the last few days, 
where they supposedly are having townhall meetings, supposedly talking 
about these issues, I have not heard the real truth come out about how 
members of the African American community who have witnessed too much 
of this really feel about the police, and I have not heard the police 
talk about how they really feel about those that they think are 
committing crimes or should be stopped or what they understand about 
them and what is going on in the community.
  So I am hopeful that we can have a real conversation. Because I want 
to tell you, as we take a look at what has happened just in the last 
year or so, what we find is 1,205 people have been shot and killed by 
on-duty police officers since January 1, 2015. In the first 6 months of 
2016, 465 people were shot and killed. In 2016, 491 were shot and 
killed. In 2016, there was a 6-percent increase in the number of such 
deaths during the first 6 months of the year.

  Fatal encounters are strikingly similar to last year's shootings, 
where Blacks continue to be shot at 2.5 times the rate of Whites. 
Police have shot and killed a young Black man ages 18-29, such as 
Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, 175 times since January 2015, and 
24 of them were known to be unarmed.
  So whether we are talking about Michael Brown, Eric Gardner, Ezell 
Ford, Tamir Rice, John Crawford, Kimani Gray, Walter Scott, Freddie 
Gray, Sandra Bland, Rekia Boyd, Laquan McDonald, or the last two that 
we have seen on television almost every night for the last week or so, 
Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, and names that we don't know--
those names are not mentioned here because they have not been reported 
and we don't have the kind of database for these killings that we 
should have.
  That is another recommendation that I am making, that we must have a 
database that is kept so that we can know for sure exactly who is being 
killed and why, supposedly, they are being killed.
  This is tough business that we have to deal with. This is painful 
business that we have to deal with. But when you see those mothers on 
television, as I saw last evening, saying: I have a 14-year-old, and I 
am afraid for his life every minute he is not with me. And folks tell 
us that you should talk to them more and you should tell them how they 
should act when they are stopped by the police.
  I want to tell you, every African American mother and father that I 
know talk to their children about the police. They are afraid that they 
are going to be killed. They are afraid that they are not going to come 
home once they leave the house. They talk to them about how to conduct 
themselves if they are stopped by the police. While

[[Page H5002]]

they shouldn't have to act any differently than anybody else, mothers 
and fathers of Black children talk to their children about that all the 
time.
  They say to them: If they stop you, make sure you keep your hands 
visible. Put them up on the dashboard so they won't think you are 
reaching for something. If they ask you to get your driver's license 
out, you tell them to take it out of your pocket because you are afraid 
that if you go in your pocket to get your driver's license there will 
be an excuse to shoot you down. Too many of them have said and will 
say, ``We thought they were reaching for a weapon.''
  Black people, for the most part, tell their young boys and their 
young men not only to keep their hands visible, but don't talk back to 
the police, make sure you don't look as if you are reaching for 
something, and be very, very careful that you don't do anything that 
will cause them to shoot you.
  Now, this is real. This goes on all the time. I don't know if people 
know or understand this.
  None of us are saying that we want our children to be in 
confrontation, that we want our men to be in confrontation, that we 
want our girls to be in confrontation with the police. We always teach 
everything that we can about staying out of a situation where there 
will be an excuse to kill or shoot you.
  Body cameras. We have advocated for body cameras. And now we find 
that, in this last incident, I believe, in Minnesota, the body camera 
somehow was on the ground and it wasn't working; or the body camera was 
not turned on, in some instances that we hear about; or even when the 
body camera records, in many instances, and maybe under practices and 
law in some cities, that information cannot be revealed for some long 
period of time until after certain things have taken place within the 
police department.
  So we have talked about that and we have advocated for body cameras. 
We were hoping that they would help us to understand what was going on. 
But we find that just plain old citizens with a cell phone are doing 
more to document what is happening than the body cameras that we 
advocated for. As a matter of fact, but for cell phones, we would not 
have known what happened in Baton Rouge and we would not have known 
what happened in Minnesota.
  The sight of a man being pinned down on the ground, unable to move, a 
gun being put at very close range to his body and being killed is more 
than most folks can bear.

                              {time}  1830

  Most folks looking at what happened in Baton Rouge and what happened 
in Minnesota know that something is wrong with that; that that is not 
right. It is not just Black folks. There are many White folks who 
understand and believe it is something wrong with this picture.
  So while we are talking about gun violence, and we would love to be 
able to focus on laws that we could create to keep the guns out of the 
hands of people who shouldn't have them, we have got to deal with also 
what is happening in our country with the confrontations between 
African American men and boys in particular, and girls, and police 
officers.
  So I share this information with you, as difficult as it is to talk 
about it, because until we get to the point of honesty about what we 
feel and what we understand and what we believe is going on, we are 
never going to be able to deal with this problem. I am going to 
continue to work on this.
  Like I said, I started in 1994. And while my attention and my career 
has been diverted to deal with financial services and other kinds of 
issues on Wall Street, I have got to get back to Main Street, and I 
have got to get back to the idea that we can do better than this, and 
that our country cannot continue to not know how to deal with it, but, 
rather, come up with creative ideas and thoughts and ways by which we 
can discontinue these killings.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________