Inside a Near Breakdown Between the White House and the Police
The New York Times
Outreach by a top administration official in recent weeks dovetails with a broader shift to the center among Democratic leaders on criminal justice issues.
WASHINGTON — Susan Rice, the White House domestic policy adviser, called the leaders of the nation’s largest policing groups last month to promise a significant reset in their relationship as the Biden administration finished an executive order on police reform, a move that averted a potential breach that had been brewing for months, according to several people briefed on the calls.
The groups welcomed Ms. Rice’s outreach, which amounted to a vow to incorporate more of their thinking in the order and possibly an implicit mea culpa. The White House had solicited input from the groups, but had not engaged with them on substance and details; their frustrations only soared in the days before her phone calls, when they were blindsided by the leak of an 18-page draft executive order that contained language they found objectionable.
Ms. Rice’s course correction dovetails with a broader shift in the White House toward a more centrist stance on policing as violent crime rises. And it underscores President Biden’s struggle to satisfy civil-rights groups, whose cries for reform hit a fever pitch after the murder of George Floyd at the hands of the police in May 2020, while blunting critics who say Democrats are soft on crime.
