Jeff Sessions ignores Trump slight; blasts ACLU agreement for Chicago murder rate in
Jeff Sessions ignores Trump slight; blasts ACLU agreement for Chicago murder rate in Waukegan speech
U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions blamed the “irresponsible consent decree” for Chicago’s high murder rate while speaking at the Genesee Theatre in Waukegan, Ill., on Sept. 19, 2018.
(Antonio Perez/Chicago Tribune)
Emily K. Coleman Contact ReporterNews-Sun
U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions did not address President Donald Trump’s attack on his performance during a Waukegan appearance Wednesday and instead focused on promoting Trump’s support for police.
Speaking to law enforcement officials at a police training conference in Waukegan, Sessions criticized Chicago’s 2015 agreement with the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois, which made changes to the city’s stop-and-frisk policy.
The comments earned quick rebuttals from the American Civil Liberties Union and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s office, who said Sessions was in town to see what was leading to murders being down 24 percent since the beginning of last year.
“I know Jeff Sessions is having a tough day with his boss, but it’s no excuse for lashing out at others and making up alternative facts,” Adam Collins, the spokesman for the mayor’s office, said in an email.
Trump’s latest jab at Sessions was to remark that he has no attorney general.
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Sessions spent Wednesday meeting with Chicago area police department leaders and had a round table discussion with community members, including, he said, “mothers whose sons were gunned down and students from high school who are exposed too often to unspeakable violence.”
“The people in these neighborhoods are entitled to the same safety and security as the people living in the mansions and gated communities on the North Shore,” he said. “They deserve the same protection as every American. They deserve to go to sleep at night without the fear of a stray bullet hitting coming through the wall as their children sleep.
Sessions also visited an intelligence center in Chicago’s 15th police district, Collins said.
The Strategic Decision Support Centers, which were established in the districts with the most violence, house civilian data analysts from the University of Chicago Crime Lab who work with officers from the district studying crime trends, helping them make sure they are putting resources in the right places at the right time.
Murders are down 24 percent since the centers were opened at the beginning of last year, according to numbers provided by Collins. Shootings are down 30 percent, leading to 631 fewer shooting victims.
Sessions did acknowledge the decrease in violent crime, saying, “Police here are doing everything in their power to reverse these trends,” but that “their hands still remain tied” by the ACLU agreement.
“Hundreds of people were gunned down for another year,” Sessions said. “And yet, there’s been recent discussion of even more restrictions on the police. Clearly, that is not the answer. That’s not the way we’re going to make communities safer. We need to get back to community-based policing, not further limit the very tactics that have the best chance to reduce crime and violence.”
He said addressing Chicago’s violence was of the utmost importance, but that the city’s political leaders have made “colossal mistakes,” including agreeing to a deal with the ACLU of Illinois.
The agreement, which is overseen by a retired federal judge, was reached in 2015 in the wake of an ACLU study that found African Americans were stopped by police at a disproportionately higher rate than Hispanics and whites, especially in predominantly white neighborhoods. In the settlement, the Chicago Police Department agreed to keep track of all investigatory street stops and protective pat-downs.
Sessions blamed the changes for the climb in murders and other violent crime pointing, as he has before, to a University of Utah study that came to the same conclusions.
“When policing went down, crime went up,” he said. “There’s a clear lesson here that if you want more shootings, more death, listen to the ACLU, Antifa, Black Lives Matter and groups who don’t know the reality of policing. If you want public safety, then listen to the police professionals.”
Karen Sheley, the ACLU of Illinois’ director of the police practices project, called Session’s assertions a promotion of “revisionist history” that ignores the local context of things contributing to crime, including the state budget impasse that was “starving” not-for-profits serving communities in Chicago, the release of the tape showing the shooting of Laquan MacDonald and the firing of the police superintendent.
“Yet again, this administration encourages unlawful behavior and strong-arm tactics, instead of supporting commitments by local police to do the hard work of building respect and relationships with the communities they serve,” Sheley said. “Black and Latino Chicagoans have lived through the decades of excessive force, unconstitutional and harassing stops, and coercive interrogations leading to false confessions.”
Sheley said through the agreement and the upcoming consent decree, the city is committing to having a police department that “follows the rules and truly serves the community.”
There was also criticism of Sessions leveled by members of Lake County-based social justice groups who gathered outside Waukegan’s Genesee Theatre during the attorney general’s remarks.
The groups of demonstrators held signs from across the street and chanted, “No hate, no fear. All immigrants are welcome here,” and “If you don’t get it, shut it down.”
Topacio Hernandez, who advocates for immigrant rights in Waukegan, said she was there to show Sessions people won't stand for intolerance due to his administration's reputation for hate and discrimination.
“I'm here for justice in general. I'm here to defend gay rights, immigrant children, freedom of religion, all of it,” Hernandez said.
Julie Contreras of the League of United American Citizens of Lake County said she was protesting the Sessions visit by exercising her constitutional right to denounce the presence of someone who espouses hate and racism.
Contreras said she was alarmed that while protesting she saw that most of the law enforcement officials who went inside the Genesee Theatre were white.
“I could count with one hand how many people of color went inside the building, Contreras said. “There is no diversity, and there needs to be so we can make sure no violations of civil laws are happening.”
Adding that the current administration's anti-immigrant sentiment does not represent the entire country, Contreras said, “We do not want this man here in our city.”
One local activist who wasn't there for Sessions but instead to give a message to the community and “incite people of color to act” was Chris “Brotha” Blanks, the founding chief president of the Black Abolition Movement for the Mind.
Blanks said he was taking the opportunity of the Sessions visit to speak to Lake County residents who gathered either for or in protest.
“We should all be raising our voice on this issue of unity through diversity,” Blanks said.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/lake-county-news-sun/news/ct-lns-jeff-sessions-appearance-st-0920-story.html#
