The Police won't Love you Back

Cops are opposed to democracy — and liberalism as whole.

This weekend Congressman Anthony D’Esposito sent a message out to the world. He tweeted “Don’t ever cross us.” accompanied by a photo of thousands and thousands of NYPD officers, and other cops from around the country, who had come to Long Island for the funeral of slain officer Jonathon Diller. Rep. D’Esposito is, unsurprisingly, former NYPD himself, although based on his language it doesn’t appear to be a thing of the past. His message got millions of views, mostly from people wondering what exactly the Congressman is threatening. If we cross the NYPD, then what? If we try to reign in the police, then what? It turns out the answer is vital to democracy, and the fight against fascism.

It’s important to know that the NYPD disrespected New York Governor Kathy Hochul just days before the funeral, at the officer’s wake. I’m not a Hochul fan, by a long shot, but the police response to the governor showing up to pay her respects is instructive. According to multiple outlets and videos she was confronted not long after showing up to Diller’s wake, and left after about 10 minutes. Hochul is now pushing back on this narrative, but there’s no doubt that she was only at the event briefly and that she’s on video being confronted. More importantly, there is absolutely no doubt that the NYPD is a pro-MAGA and Trump organization and is all too willing to attack Democrats, citizens, journalists, and more.

The events of this past weekend are just the latest in a string of increasingly far-right actions from New York’s finest, and from police across the country. In the past few months an NYPD chief has gone after a judge (the wrong judge it turns out) on social media, and they have also gone after independent journalist Talia Jane, political commentator Olayemi Olurin, and local reporter Harry Siegel, all on official police accounts. In every case the offense of the person being ranted about has been questioning the police, or their narrative, an act which apparently merits openly targeting New York residents by name before millions of people. And each time there has been no consequence of any kind. This type of impunity is dangerous, particularly when so-called public servants are going after the public. “Don’t ever cross us” begins to sound slightly more sinister.

And it’s not just rhetoric from the NYPD. They have also been using oppressive, violent, and aggressive policing tactics, both in their day-to-day policing and against protests in particular. Stop-and-frisk, long deemed unconstitutional, has skyrocketed under Eric Adams to its highest level in over a decade. It was ruled illegal because it’s known to be a racist tactic – and 89% of those stopped last year were Black and Latinx. In a similar vein, a New York Court approved an overhaul of NYPD protest policing, a ruling they have since ignored as they repeatedly attack and suppress every pro-Palestine protest in the city.

The pattern of impunity, lawlessness, and targeting of anyone who opposes the NYPD is clear. And that’s a major part of why they want Republicans and Donald Trump to be re-elected. Democratic politicians in New York are, on average, fond of the police. But they’re (mostly) not as into fascism, scorched earth law-and-order rhetoric, and unchecked police power as their Republican counterparts. Any questioning, any reigning in of police power is viewed as a threat that must be crushed by law enforcement officers who claim to serve and protect us. That’s why they endorsed Trump in 2020, endorsed MAGA candidates in local elections, and will endorse Trump again this year. That’s why they confronted pro-police Governor Kathy Hochul and continuously go after progressive politicians.

Photo by ev on Unsplash

And that’s just one police force. Across the country cops killed 1,232 people in 2023, a record number, and police are simultaneously being more and more overt about their disregard for democracy and their love of Trump. That dozens of law enforcement officers from multiple states participated in the January 6th insurrection should have been a red flag for everyone, and in the years since we’ve seen how deeply the police are connected with the far-right. From taking selfies with Trump, to policing fascists with kid gloves while attacking anti-fascists, to the many, many members of law enforcement in far-right groups, the dangerous reality of our police forces has been made clear. A Reuters expose even showed us how U.S. police trainers with far-right ties are teaching hundreds of cops across the country.

I didn’t present this bundle of evidence of how police are openly walking hand-in-hand with the far-right and embracing fascism because it’s fun to reminisce over. I wanted to present it to you, particularly in the context of an NYPD Congressman threatening the public, because this is one of the issues where a bunch of us need an urgent wake-up call. 

I think of Governor Hochul wanting to fund the police, ally with the police, and be liked by the police when they’re pro-Trump fascists who will never respect her. I think of mayors and council-members across the country who refuse to take money from the police and put it into our communities, even when police unions fight night and day to make every progressive, liberal, and even moderate politician lose their next election. I think of the narrative that Democrats keep pushing about how great the police are because several officers from the Capitol police tried to stop or did stop MAGA adherents on January 6th, while they ignore how one police union after another supports Trump with their substantial financial resources.

Just your average police merch.

The message for Democratic politicians is simple: the police will not love you back. Moving to the right to court indoctrinated fascists does not work. These guys think moderate Joe Biden is a China-loving communist. Courting cops empowers them as they in turn try to topple democracy and bring about a police state where they can go unquestioned and siphon our money from city coffers even more. They eagerly attack and arrest members of any movement for the social good, they back their fellow cops no matter how atrocious the crime another officer commits, and they have no interest in democracy.

So, if you have an idealized conception of the police as friendly cops patrolling the neighborhood and helping out, please let it go. That is both not the function of policing and not the role they are currently playing in society. Police across America are a powerful force for the right, for Trump, for fascism. They are militarized, politicized, and starkly polarized. They don’t hide this, and they haven’t for some time. This year they will invest heavily in the Trump campaign, and the campaigns of local MAGA candidates, and hope that what they get in return is even more power and even less oversight. Police are a dangerous political engine with no sympathy for liberals or liberalism.

No matter what liberals do, the police will not love you back. And I hope that realization can be just the first step in checking their vast power, which has become a danger to democracy itself. Time is running out and if we are to have any semblance of a decent future, it requires confronting police money and power. As Geo Maher says: “The history of American police is the history of their expanding power, and it is a voracious power that accepts no limits: a fascist power.”