Georgia representative Hank Johnson introduced the Stop Militarizing Law Enforcement Act of 2019, H.R. 1714, which would place restrictions and transparency measures on a program that transfers excess military equipment to federal, tribal, state and local law enforcement agencies.

Through the Defense Logistics Agency’s Law Enforcement Support Office, or “1033 program,” the Department of Defense has transferred $6.8 billion in surplus military equipment — often from warzones overseas — to American streets without charge.

In 2017, President Trump rescinded Obama’s executive order and fully restored the Pentagon’s 1033 program.

“Our neighborhoods need to be protected, but Americans and our founding fathers opposed blurring the line between police and the military,” Johnson said. “Before another small town is transformed into a warzone, with gifts of grenade launchers and high-caliber rifles, we must rein in this program and revisit our view of the future safety of American cities and towns.”

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The program has received criticism and has proven the need for oversight, especially after, in 2017, faux police organizations were able to get $1.2 million in military gear through the program.

A Government Accountability Office report issued on the 2017 incident listed some of the gear obtained, including night-vision goggles, simulated M-16A2 rifles, and pipe bomb equipment. The rifles and bomb equipment could have been made functional with widely available parts, the report said.

Thus, the bill introduced by Rep. Johnson would:

  • Prevent transfers of equipment inappropriate for local policing; such as military weapons, long-range acoustic devices, grenade launchers, weaponized drones, armored military vehicles, and grenades or similar explosives.
  • Require recipients to certify they could account for all military weapons and equipment. In 2012, the weapons portion of the 1033 program was temporarily suspended after DOD found a local sheriff gifted out army-surplus Humvees and other supplies. This bill would prohibit re-gifting, and require recipients to account for all DOD weapons and equipment.
  • Add requirements to enforce tracking mechanisms that keep up with, and control transfers of the equipment, implement policies to ensure police agencies could not surplus the equipment for resale and define drones in a clearer way.

The bill reportedly has 66 co-sponsors, as well as support from organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC).

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