Pick A Side_LA28

UNDOING THE WORK.

After the murder of George Floyd in May 2020 and the national uprising and demands for defunding the police that followed, the Movement for Black Lives successfully pressured the City of L.A. to explore unprecedented cuts to the police budget.

But the plan to expand local security for the Olympics would not only undo that progress — it would take us in the opposite direction.

Sure enough, the L.A. police union (LAPPL) is already using the Olympics to argue that L.A. “cannot afford” the proposed cuts. Here’s what the directors are saying:

Not Just LAPD — All cops love the Olympics.

The L.A. Sheriff’s Department wants to grow too. At a county board of supervisors meeting in January 2019, Sheriff Alex Villanueva said this about his department’s budget:

“We’re getting smaller when we need to actually get bigger. In anticipation of obviously the projected future growth — Olympics and all those things — we need to get back to full staffing in order to provide the training that we need for the entire organization […]”

And the coordination is just beginning. On February 23, 2021, LA City Council moved forward with an MOU on the California Olympic and Paralympic Public Safety Command (COPPSC). This will be co-chaired by LAPD Chief Michael Moore, but will also include representatives from potentially dozens of other law enforcement agencies. The goal: expand the footprint of policing in the region in preparation for the Games, and hire up more full-time officers to ensure that any efforts made to shrink local police forces in the name of racial justice are undone.

This doesn’t have to happen.

The Olympics do not create an actual need for more police.

They are used to justify the expansion of police.

Oh, and did we mention that LA28 is a designated “National Special Security Event” (NSSE)? That means that LAPD would be backed by the Department of Homeland Security forces — including I.C.E.

How will giving broad powers to I.C.E. affect the nearly one million undocumented people living in the L.A. area?

The LA28 committee, who is organizing the Olympics, says that Federal coordination will “only” begin one or two years before the Games. That represents potentially years of oppression for Los Angeles’ vulnerable immigrant population. This is an unacceptable loss of autonomy for a city whose people have no interest in further criminalizing this population.

The Olympics do not exist for LA. They will happen to LA. And the results will be catastrophic for Black and brown Angelenos.

LAPD has around 10,000 officers today. For the 2028 Olympics, they want to hire 3,000 more.

UNDOING THE WORK.

Not Just LAPD — All cops love the Olympics.

This doesn’t have to happen.

We are again in a moment of awakening about the racism and violence inherent in policing. If we host the Olympics again, history shows us that they will ensure even more suffering for the communities that the Movement for Black Lives has risen up to defend.