What on Earth Is This Statement From the Fraternal Order of Police?

Membership Ticker

BREAKING: Good journalism costs money.
And we need a lot of both right now. We’re short of our August goal of $163,000 in online donations, and it’s not going to get any easier next month when election noise and news will be even louder. You know what’s at stake. And you know Mother Jones is up for it. Will you pitch in now so we can do our best work?

We need to raise $163,000 before the month ends and the election noise and news get louder. You know what’s at stake. And you know Mother Jones is up for it. Please help if you can.

President Donald Trump signs an executive order during the International Association of Chiefs of Police Annual Conference and Exposition, at the McCormick Place Convention Center Chicago, Monday, Oct. 28, 2019, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)Evan Vucci / Associated Press

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

Here’s something to keep in mind the next time you see someone get tackled by a dozen cops for fare evasion:

The Fraternal Order of Police exists, in part, to defend these rights, not just for police officers, but for all citizens at every level, from the indigent living on the street to the President living in the White House. pic.twitter.com/sea0WYT4AD

— National FOP (@GLFOP) October 29, 2019

Did you catch that? “…not just for police officers, but for all citizens at every level, from the indigent living on the street to the President living in the White House“? That’s the National Fraternal Order of Police very unsubtly rebuking congressional Democrats for their investigation into President Donald Trump’s Ukraine scandal. Trump, who has cracked jokes about police brutality and falsely accused his opponents of various capital crimes (“TREASON?”), has been warmly received by law enforcement agencies throughout his presidency, and the FOP, an organization of more than 300,000 law enforcement officers, released its statement one day after the president spoke to the International Conference of Chiefs of Police in Chicago.

Impeachment is not a legal process; it is a constitutional process. But it is unfolding in a way that’s similar to a criminal case: The House is currently in the preliminary stages of investigating reports of a high crime and/or misdemeanor, and if it decides to move forward on impeachment—the equivalent of an indictment—there will be a public trial in the Senate, where evidence will be heard and debated and the defendant will have a chance to defend himself. Due process! FOP’s concerns about transparency are all the more phony coming, as they do, from a group of people who have spent their entire careers preparing cases for grand juries—which as a rule, take place behind closed doors, with no input from defense attorneys.

But since they brought it up, this is what due process looks like to “the indigent living on the street.”