Post-2020 police defunding waves were quickly reversed without sustained reform

Evidence

The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, introduced by Democratic Congress members in February 2021 in response to the Black Lives Matter protests, stalled due to Republican resistance in the Senate. In October 2021, the New York Times reported that many police departments that experienced post-2020 cuts had seen their previous budgets restored or even increased. Police brutality has continued to rise in the interim. According to the Mapping Police Violence project, US law enforcement officers killed 1,200 people in 2022.9 It was the highest recorded tally since the organization began collecting data, and it continued to rise in 2023 and 2024. — Anton Jäger, Hyperpolitics, 238