Mary-Charlotte Domandi:
The thing that I’ve been thinking about since we, since we last talk and that so many people are thinking about is the failure of law enforcement during the January 6th insurrection at the us Capitol. And I went back to this episode of Democracy Now that I was thinking about that I remembered from 2017, right after Charlottesville, in which a former white supremacist was talking about how much recruiting had been done over the last 30 years, um, in the military and in law enforcement and even elected office. And this was part of their long-term strategy when they realized that being skinheads in combat boots wasn’t working and they wanted to recruit basically more people. So they “traded in their boots for suits.” And here they are 30 years later. And what he said was, and this was three years ago, what was then my dream and now my nightmare, because he came out of all that, has been realized. So in other words, white supremacists are deeply entrenched in law enforcement, in the military. It’s difficult to know who they are. I know there’s not a magic solution. I know you don’t have a magic solution, but how do you think about addressing this?
Teresa Leger Fernandez:
Well, I mean, the most immediate thing is that there have been, I mean, people have been suspended and they’ve been let go and on on. But part of that is, I mean, what we saw with the Capitol police is they have a history of failures. Like many police are places around the United States, the Capitol police have a history and a problem with regards to a range of issues, including sexual misconduct and other matters. And I think what it is is that in police forces around the country, you have lots of policemen who, and police women, who are really dedicated to the concept of serving. And then you also have others who are drawn to, the police force precisely because of the militaristic nature and other matters.
And so it is it’s going to require, and it’s going to require not just in the Capitol police, but everywhere, including New Mexico, that we start recruiting and training a different kind of personality that really is there for the service and not for the adrenaline and the power. And that is going to have to happen everywhere. And I think that the, actually the person who replaced the Capitol police is a black woman. She briefed us today, and it just felt different when she was just being upfront about, these are the issues we need to address. And so those are the kinds of things that we are just going to have to start doing in the military. I mean, everywhere, right? That’s like everywhere we have to do the work that they’re all complaining about now. They don’t want bias training. They don’t want empathy, training. They don’t want any of that stuff. That’s what they’re complaining about. Cause they don’t want to be surrounded by people who are, who become more aware, become more awake and aware of these kinds of issues. And so that’s just something that we’re going to have to do at every level.
