Walker Police Comments Draw Mixed Response From Wisconsin Law Enforcement

Members of Wisconsin’s law enforcement community are taking different stances on Gov. Scott Walker’s recent foray into the ongoing debate over policing and race in the United States.

In an online opinion piece published this week, Walker condemned recent killings of police officers, calling it a disturbing trend, and criticized President Barack Obama for allowing what Walker perceives as an increase in anti-police rhetoric. He said, if elected, he will ensure police get the respect and protection they deserve.

The director of Wisconsin Professional Police Association, Jim Palmer, said many police officers agree with the governor.

“There have been missed opportunities for the president to use the platform that he has to express more support for law enforcement officers and to help temper some of the rhetoric,” Palmer said.

But David Couper, the former Madison police chief, said the most recent statistics don’t support Walker’s suggestion that police shootings are on the rise.

“That’s not what the data show,” he said, adding that fatal police shootings are actually down by 13 percent over last year.

Couper, citing data from a 2015 report by the National Law Enforcement Memorial Fund, said the number of police officers killed in traffic accidents rose by 36 percent over last year. He said it would make more sense to focus on that than police shootings, which have been declining steadily since 2011.

Walker’s column refers to the increase in what he calls “inflammatory and disgusting rhetoric” at recent protests against police use of force, where protesters were calling cops “pigs” that should be “fried like bacon.”

Couper acknowledged that such chants are “scary” and pointed to a recent incident in Madison this week where neighborhood residents reportedly yelled, “We should start killing the police” when an officer tried to break up a fight between two women.

But Couper said the deteriorating relationship between police and communities of color is something law enforcement has to confront, and that blaming the president won’t help change the situation.

“I think they need to address the fact that people of color are not seeing them in a positive light. They’ve got to move out and start working closely with the community, start being trustworthy, start being controlled in their use of force, and start treating everyone they come in contact with with respect,” Couper said. “It’s part of the attitude that’s going on in the country, and the only people that change it are the police. Nobody else can do that.”