Minnesota employs roughly 11,000 police officers. Fewer than 250 are Black—or barely 2 percent in a state where 7 percent of the people are Black. Of the 417 law enforcement agencies and departments in the state, only four police chiefs are Black—less than 1 percent.
One of them is Blair Anderson, the chief in St. Cloud, Minnesota, who acknowledges the disparities and his own fear of unknown police officers but also says that he has seen white officers serve communities of color with compassion. It frustrates him, he says through tears as we speak just after former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was convicted on all counts for the murder of George Floyd, that “they get lumped in with the dumbass who does something so abhorrent that we all get painted with that same broad brush. I see them every day, and they feel like shit. They're like, ‘I didn't kill anybody.’ All I’ve done was try to serve.” He adds, “We are aware there are bad people in our profession that don’t need to be there. But the vast majority of people out here doing this job... are doing it the right way, for the right reasons.”
Still, Anderson says, there’s a lot of work to be done to restore the trust that many have lost in the uniform. As residents reeled from the trauma and grief of the Chauvin trial, for example, Daunte Wright, a Black 20-year-old man, was killed by yet another white police officer in Brooklyn Center, about 10 miles from where Chauvin stood trial. A familiar outcry followed in the state where Black men and women like Philando Castile, Martha Donald, Jamar Clark, and Mark Henderson were all killed at the hands of police. Since 2000, there have been 208 police-involved deaths in Minnesota; 26 percent of victims have been Black. “I tell my officers that this uniform is a symbol of a lot of things to different people,” Anderson says. “It's a symbol of service. It's a symbol of sacrifice. But to some people, it's a symbol of oppression and brutality and violence. I'm not disavowing myself of our country's history.” In the interview below, which has been edited and condensed for clarity, the chief discusses the Chauvin verdict, rising racial tensions in Minnesota, and the future of policing.
Chauvin was found guilty on all counts. What’s your reaction?
Chief Anderson: The system of jurisprudence works. That might not work for your story because it sounds too canned. [But] I’m just being honest. The jury absorbed the evidence presented and made their decision. They determined that what they saw is not something that should be happening. In my 26 years as a cop, I have never been trained to put my knee on somebody's neck. I've been trained to subdue by putting my knee in between someone’s shoulder blades, at the base of their neck. As soon as I have them under control, the training instructs me to roll them over into the recovery position and make sure they are OK.
This verdict is bigger than the state of Minnesota. This was not a training issue—this was a character issue. Prosecutor Jerry Blackwell said that people in our custody are in our care during the trial, and that's the simple truth. It’s the oath we take. And that's how we are trained: Anyone in our custody, we’re responsible for their welfare, period, no matter what they've done. So when I hire, I look for good character so that I don't have to teach morality.
It seems, though, America’s sigh of relief was short-lived. What’s your take on what happened in Columbus (where a Black teenager, Ma'Khia Bryant, was fatally shot by a white police officer on the same day that Chauvin was convicted)? This brings up the issue of de-escalation and the use of excessive lethal force, adding to the rising tensions against policing in America.
It's tragic. It’s horrible that a 16-year-old girl lost her life. After seeing what the body camera captured, one person was going to stab another person that was leaned up against the car (which could’ve happened in a matter of seconds) and cause them great bodily harm, or worse; the person on the car had nowhere to go; an officer giving verbal commands to the person swinging the knife and came pretty close to stabbing that other person; I don't know what else that officer could have done to prevent harm. Deadly force is authorized by law enforcement to protect the lives of themselves or a third party. And from watching that video that's exactly what it looks like that officer was doing.
Should he have fired four shots? I wasn't there, so I can’t assess those split-second decisions. But does it really matter how many times the officer fired? Think about it this way: what would you want that officer to do if you were the person on the other end of that knife? I understand the rising tensions right now. However, civilians should believe their eyes—just as was said during the Chauvin trial. Whether I'm law enforcement or not, does the video show one person attempting to stab, and potentially kill, another person? Is one person in imminent danger and in need of protection? That's what I saw in that two-minute video. The officer gave his verbal commands that were not adhered to, and our job is to serve and protect. Whether people like it or not, that was an authorized use of force situation.
Like everybody else, I’m waiting for the full investigation and I hope that's done by an independent agency. But, I do appreciate not only as a law enforcement professional but as a citizen, that Columbus PD got that footage out as quickly as they did.
Your state has endured the deaths of so many unarmed Black men and women. When it comes to policing communities of color, what could be done to ease those tensions between officers and civilians?
The tensions are real. I’ve experienced it myself. I’m the chief of police, and when I see a squad car behind me, my heart skips a beat. When I was a captain, I was wrongfully felony-stopped by a white officer and pulled out of my car, faced down, and [had] a gun pointed at my head. And when the officer approached me, I told him, “Hey, I’m a police officer. My service weapon is in my bag.” He responded with, “Yeah, yeah. Shut up.” I later had a meeting with his chief and found out that he was already under investigation.
It’s never simple to weed out the bad apples or cut down rotten trees, there’s so much red tape to doing what’s right for your department and community. In Minnesota, we have the binding arbitration system. Until we change that, we will have difficulty getting rid of people who don't belong in this profession. Officers have due process, as well they should. We ask them to do a tough job. But when somebody creates an offense that is so egregious that it rises right to the level of termination, we have to go through that process. If an arbitrator says, “You have to take them back,” we must. These are things that I have implored our state legislature to fix first. Forget about police reform, that is not practical. People insist that we get rid of the bad cops to bolster community relations and ease racial tensions when some have been perpetrators, and some of us have tried. We've just not been successful because the binding arbitration system won’t let us.
Then there’s retaliation from the officer to worry about. It can be intimidating for some law-enforcement leaders because you don’t want to feel like you’re retaliating against somebody just because you couldn't fire him. But now the officer has that in their back pocket. The binding arbitration system is not just in Minnesota; it’s in other states. This is why people in my position have not been able to get rid of officers who have continuously demonstrated that they are not worthy of the badge.
Attorney General Merrick Garland announced he’s launching a new investigation into the Minneapolis Police Department’s policing practices. What does this do for morale?
I don't run the Minneapolis police department so cannot speak to how they are handling this particular probe. But, any good agency, any good cop out on the street should have no problem with accountability, or being investigated, or having other folks find facts and making a determination based on their investigation and what they find.
I would always welcome an investigation into my agency’s policing practices. When we do have an incident that involves the death of another human being or whether there's a conflict of interest, we don't wait for outside agencies to come in, we call them. We want to be transparent and we want the public to know that we're not trying to police ourselves. We want somebody who has an independent viewpoint to come in and take a look at what actually happened.
Police reform; defund the police; ACAB. How do you, as a law enforcement leader, receive all of this?
Our elected local and federal officials need to slow down and not be so impetuous about police reform. Some of the bills I've testified against are not sustainable. People are suggesting there should no longer be no-knock warrants, for example. Do we really believe the bad guys are not listening to that nonsense? Do we think that they are not saying, Oh, yeah, get rid of no-knock warrants? Get rid of all traffic stops so nobody can stop me because my taillight is out.
One bill that went forward in our statehouse was that all police officers should carry personal liability insurance—who's realistically going to be able to afford that? Then, find me an insurance company that will underwrite that. These types of requirements are going to drive good people out of the profession. I’ve implored legislators from both sides of the aisle to talk to subject matter experts, speak to us, before drafting or introducing hasty reform bills. Where else in history have we decided we're going to reform an entire industry without talking to anybody in that industry?
I'd like for people to just take a breath, step back and understand what officers have been asked to do. When a call comes in, we go because we don’t have the luxury of saying, Can you call us back tomorrow? We respond even after civilians have spat upon us, called us names, threw rocks or bricks or bottles at us, derided or chastised us. The majority of police officers answer the call with one thing in mind: We want things to be better when we leave than they were when we got there.
And when we respond and get it wrong, because we're human and we are not mental health professionals, we get the blowtorch. And that’s not fair. Go ahead and criticize us when we screw up because we will take the heat. And there are plenty of instances where we do screw up. But stop asking us to be all things to all people. Where are all the other entities that failed that person before they got to us? Nobody wants to talk about that. And that’s part of my frustration.
What about the future of policing? What can Minnesota, and the country at large, learn from this past year?
If lawmakers and activists and those clamoring for no police or defund the police get their way, they're going to be sorry. Because the bad folks are watching. Until you can tell me with certainty that there are no more bad people in the world—no more predators, no more murderers, no more robbers—then I don't want to hear what you have to say. I've dedicated my whole life to serving this country, to serving my community, and so have a lot of other people.
Law enforcement needs to have an opinion on how policing progresses in America and what change can look like, no matter how pissed off people are at us, because of things that have happened historically. As a Black man, I'm offended because I'm used to being judged by the worst element in our group. But that's what's happening to the police across the nation now. We are all being judged by the worst part in our group, even though the whole world knows it's a tiny percentage that act as the perpetrators against the call of the badge.
Is there a plan to increase representation in the police department so more officers look like the communities they serve?
I'm a realist: There are not that many people of color in the applicant pool. Minnesota is one of the first states to require a bachelor’s degree to become a police officer. When I came into the profession 26 years ago, most people of color in college weren't thinking about law enforcement or criminal justice. They were in business programs, pre-law, or pre-med. They didn't see policing as a viable career option. So, when it comes to recruiting, we are behind, and we're working on it. When you have such a small pool of applicants to choose from, it's hard to make every community have people of color represented within the different police agencies. They're just not enough people. If I have 40 percent people of color in my community, I‘d love to have a 40 percent representation of people of color on the force, but that's just not realistic at the moment.
What does it mean to be a Black police chief in America?
I have dedicated my entire adult life to public service: I enlisted in the Army when I was 19 and have served my country and my respective communities since. Right now, the police are in everybody's crosshairs. I'm frustrated, hurt, gut-wrenched, and saddened. There are days when I cry, and I'm not ashamed to admit that. Because when I was twentysomething, I thought by the time I was fiftysomething, we would have figured this—the racial tensions, the division, the inequality—shit out. And we haven't. We have lost ground that was gained for us during the Civil Rights Movement. But, I have to be optimistic. I get an opportunity to try and make a difference every day. Many people are trying and working hard to keep this profession as magnanimous as we all believe it is and should be.
