A.G. Gancarski
Duval County Sheriff John Rutherford is not a declared candidate in Congressional District 6’s race to replace Ron DeSantis yet. The only declared candidate so far is Adam Barringer.
If he does run, as is expected, he will have two problems to overcome.
The first problem: He’s not actually a district resident. Nor has he represented voters in that district. They will know him via Jacksonville media, mostly. It remains to be seen whether that will help or hurt him.
The second problem: What would he bring to the table?
That question, luckily for Rutherford supporters, is easily answered.
An analogue to Rutherford may well be a sheriff from the Pacific Time Zone: Washington Republican Dave Reichert, who is described by Roll Call as the GOP’s “point person on policing.”
“I view myself as a cop in Congress,” Reichert told Emma Dumain, the author of the piece, “versus a congressman who used to be a cop.”
Reichert, like Rutherford, was a police lifer. The biggest coup of his career: capturing the Green River Killer.
Also like Rutherford, Reichert has been a proponent of community policing. Recall that one of his major conflicts with outgoing Jacksonville Mayor Alvin Brown was the elimination of 92 community service officer positions during a budget crunch.
At [last] Tuesday’s GOP leadership news conference, Reichert was brought in to discuss the importance of funding community police resources in the fiscal 2016 CJS spending bill, which — like every other appropriations bill this year — has come under siege from all sides.
“It was intentional to bring him in today,” said House GOP Conference Chairwoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers, also from Washington. “With all the unrest around the country and growing scrutiny over local law enforcement, I think his perspective and his leadership is really important at this time.”
Indeed, the news brims with stories about perceived police excesses. We saw it most recently with the pool party gone wrong in McKinney, Texas. Before that, Baltimore, North Charleston, and Ferguson illustrated problems with the paradigm.
The open question is whether or not Rutherford can or will take on this type of role. The Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office under his watch was not exactly a hotbed of innovation and reform. The tactics Rutherford used and advocated were mostly old school, and it was no accident that most of the men who ran to replace him did so by establishing differences from, not similarities to him.
To effectively assume such a role, Rutherford would have to get comfortable quickly with the rhetoric of reform, as Reichert has.
With his background, Reichert might succeed in bridging the very real gap between Republicans and Democrats on community policing.
House Republicans have largely steered clear of the charged national debate that has exploded in the wake of the recurring instances of young African-American men dying after violent encounters with police. But Democrats — particularly members of the Congressional Black Caucus — have demanded action.
Reichert, who is white, thinks there’s an opportunity for common ground. While he didn’t address the racial tensions underscoring the debate, he acknowledged police might be at fault.
“Cops make mistakes,” he said, “and that’s what we have to admit. We have to hold them accountable.”
It remains to be seen, of course, whether Rutherford ultimately will run for this seat. If he does, he will need a unique value add that separates him from the pack of more local contenders. Perhaps the Reichert model will fit him.
