Many cities yanked officers out of schools while reassessing policing after George Floyd’s 2020 murder. However well-intentioned, the experiment has left kids more vulnerable and classrooms less safe amid surging youth violence. That’s why a notable number have already reversed course — including, in this region, Alexandria and Montgomery County. Other jurisdictions, from Boston to Phoenix, are actively debating whether to follow.
D.C. should join them. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) has proposed fully funding the school resource officer program in her last three budgets, including the one currently under consideration. But the D.C. Council rejected her requests in 2021 and 2022. Council members should listen to the pleas of parents, principals and police.
Granted, D.C. was less rash than other places. The council voted to gradually remove officers from schools through 2025, down from 100 to 60 last year and 40 now. The current plan is to go to 20 next school year and zero the year after.
D.C. created its school resource officer program after a student was fatally shot inside Ballou High School in Southeast in 2004. Of course the problem of youth violence extends far beyond school grounds. In 2022, 16 juveniles were fatally shot in the District and 82 others were wounded.
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End of carousel- D.C. Council reverses itself on school resource officers. Good.
- Virginia makes a mistake by pulling out of an election fraud detection group.
- Vietnam sentences another democracy activist.
- Biden has a new border plan.
The D.C. Council voted on Tuesday to stop pulling police officers out of schools, a big win for student safety. Parents and principals overwhelmingly support keeping school resource officers around because they help de-escalate violent situations. D.C. joins a growing number of jurisdictions, from Montgomery County, Md., to Denver, in reversing course after withdrawing officers from school grounds following George Floyd’s murder. Read our recent editorial on why D.C. needs SROs.
Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) just withdrew Virginia from a data-sharing consortium, ERIC, that made the commonwealth’s elections more secure, following Republicans in seven other states in falling prey to disinformation peddled by election deniers. Former GOP governor Robert F. McDonnell made Virginia a founding member of ERIC in 2012, and until recently conservatives touted the group as a tool to combat voter fraud. D.C. and Maryland plan to remain. Read our recent editorial on ERIC.
In Vietnam, a one-party state, democracy activist Tran Van Bang was sentenced on Friday to eight years in prison and three years probation for writing 39 Facebook posts. The court claimed he had defamed the state in his writings, according to Radio Free Asia. In the past six years, at least 60 bloggers and activists have been sentenced to between 4 and 15 years in prison under the law, Human Rights Watch found. Read more of the Editorial Board’s coverage on autocracy and Vietnam.
The Department of Homeland Security has provided details of a plan to prevent a migrant surge along the southern border. The administration would presumptively deny asylum to migrants who failed to seek it in a third country en route — unless they face “an extreme and imminent threat” of rape, kidnapping, torture or murder. Critics allege that this is akin to an illegal Trump-era policy. In fact, President Biden is acting lawfully in response to what was fast becoming an unmanageable flow at the border. Read our most recent editorial on the U.S. asylum system.
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Of the 1,400 youths arrested in the capital city in 2022, 200 were detained for violent crimes, including homicide, carjacking and armed robbery. The problem has continued this year: A man working for the city’s Safe Passage program, created to help escort kids out of schoolhouses, was fatally shot in January outside Coolidge High in Northwest.