One year after George Floyd's death, there's cautious optimism for police reform

Philonise Floyd, the brother of George Floyd, emerged from the ornate Lyndon Baines Johnson Room on the second floor of the U.S. Capitol. He had just finished a meeting with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer along with other families of police violence victims, including Eric Garner, Botham Jean and Terence Crutcher. A black mask covered his face with the numbers 8:46 - the length of time his brother was originally believed to have been pinned to the ground by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin. Testimony during the Chauvin trial later revealed it was actually 9 minutes and 29 seconds. 

"This legislation has my brother's blood on it and all the other families' blood on it," he told a small group of reporters squeezed in front of an elevator bank outside of the Senate chamber. "We're hurting, we're still in pain."  It's been one month since his last visit to Capitol Hill to lobby for the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which passed the House in March. With its fate now in the hands of the Senate, the Floyd family is returning to Washington Tuesday to meet privately with President Biden at the White House on the one-year anniversary of Floyd's killing — although it won't be for a signing ceremony.