All eyes are on Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who’s emerged as a leading contender for Kamala Harris’s vice presidential pick for the 2024 Democratic ticket. As the national spotlight focuses on Walz, critics have drawn attention to his decision to call the National Guard on protesters against police brutality in 2020. And now, Minnesota police are calling on Walz to remove a reform prosecutor from police use of force cases.
After Minneapolis police killed George Floyd in 2020, voters elected a reform prosecutor, Mary Moriarty, who promised to prosecute police misconduct and take a restorative justice approach to prosecution.
The letter to Walz sent Wednesday from the Minnesota Police and Peace Officers Association, a copy of which was obtained by The Intercept, asks the governor to remove Moriarty’s office from all past, present, and future police use of force cases. With a former prosecutor as the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, this pressure on Walz brings to the fore the split within the Democratic Party over how to handle the demand for continued police and criminal justice reform, as conservatives and law enforcement push to undo the reforms that have been put in place.
The push against Moriarty isn’t unique to Minnesota. Critics of reform have moved to oust or restrict the authority of prosecutors in dozens of states as reformers started winning elections more frequently amid the growing push for criminal justice reform. Between 2017 and early 2023, more........