Rick Scott tackles police reform, Black Lives Matter

Sen. Rick Scott talked police reform, BLM on Thursday.

Sen. Rick Scott, on 1290 WJNO Thursday morning, opined on police reform and the potential Communist ties of Black Lives Matter, in the context of the police assassination of George Floyd.

The timing is not accidental, with President Donald Trump giving a reform speech in Texas and the House and Senate working on potential reform packages , which currently are at partisan loggerheads.

Scott’s vision for reform, as expressed on the right-leaning segment, seemed more aspirational than practical, with no mention of banning chokeholds or other checks and balances against rogue cops.

The Senator’s “heart goes out” to Floyd, and he concedes that “people are frustrated.”

But Scott, a former Governor who branded heavily with police across Florida, notes that most law enforcement officers “are good people, people trying to do the right thing.”

“We have to look at why this is happening, and we have to find out what the underlying problems are, and then we have to figure out how to address them,” Scott said.

The Senator added that he is working with Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, the lone African-American Republican in the Senate, on reform proposals.

“What I want to do is make sure whatever we do, we have real accountability,” Scott said, not explaining what that accountability would look like exactly, before pivoting to African-American high school graduation rates.

“If we have an issue, we don’t have enough African-Americans finishing high school,” Scott said, “we need to change, we need to make sure we change.”

One of Scott’s successes as Governor was an overall increase in high school graduation rates, with African-American rates going up 16% in the last five years of his tenure, but he did not mention that in the radio spot.

“If we have issues with law enforcement, we’ll figure out what those issues are,” Scott said. “I don’t want this to ever happen again to anybody.”

“I’m hopeful they will continue to recruit great people,” Scott said, noting that “law enforcement is a very, very tough job.”

The wide-ranging interview touched on Black Lives Matter and an alleged connection with communism coming into our society in a greater way.

“Oh, you hope not,” Scott said, deftly sidestepping the bait from the questioner, then reverting to familiar talking points on the stark differences between the United States and Cuba and China in terms of personal freedoms.