In
a
prepared statement given by Officer
Andersen wrote: “On April 9th 2021, Kathy Smith lost her husband, Zander and
Jazlyn lost their father and the law enforcement family lost a brother.
Sergeant Smith made the ultimate sacrifice. And from all I’ve learned about him
and the leader he was, he wouldn’t have had it any other way, but to be sent first
and protect his men. I ask you today to lead like Jim would – by defending us,
protecting us, caring for us, and validating the work we do. As law-enforcement
officers we talk about holding the line, the thin blue line. Serving and
protecting those in need. We need our families, our friends, our communities
and our nation’s leaders to have our back as we fight to hold that line.
Because without that support, the line cannot be held.”
Sergeant
Smith’s widow, Kathy Smith,
submitted written
testimony
honoring her late husband and calling for more support for law enforcement
officers. She wrote: “I write this letter urging you to take steps to protect
our law enforcement against attacks on their lives. These men and women in blue
made a promise to serve and protect the people in our communities while facing
the risk of paying the ultimate sacrifice. They do so willingly and with great
courage each and every day. My husband had a love for justice and was one of
the many who swore to protect others. He, along with many others, ended up
giving his life for the sake of Justice. It is in honor of him and the fallen
heroes that I plead with you to do something to help prevent future losses of
our law enforcement officers.”
Last
year, 73 officers were intentionally killed, increasing from the previous year
by 59 percent. Stories of ambush attacks and murders of law enforcement in Los
Angeles, Philadelphia and other major cities have highlighted the 133 officers
shot in ambush styles of attack. Iowa officers are faced with the same issues.
Grassley recognized
Sergeant Smith on the Senate
floor last year after his murder.
For
months, Grassley has been calling on the chairman of the Senate Judiciary
Committee to hold hearings on the rising crime rates. He led a press conference
on the
rising crime in
America
and commemorated
‘National Police
Week’
in May. Grassley continues to
back the blue by leading
bipartisan bills supporting America’s law enforcement officers and investing in
our communities.
Photos from the hearing can be found
HERE
and
HERE.
Grassley’s
opening remarks can be found
HERE
and below.
Prepared Statement
by U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa
Ranking Member,
Senate Judiciary Committee
Hearing on “Law
Enforcement Officer Safety: Protecting Those Who Serve and Protect”
Tuesday, July 26,
2022
Thank
you, Chairman Durbin, for holding this important hearing. I requested the
hearing, and I appreciate it.
Attacks
on police officers are rising across the country. We see news stories on a
regular basis about ambush attacks and murders of law enforcement in Los
Angeles, Philadelphia and elsewhere. Even my home state of Iowa has not escaped
this violence.
Nationwide,
73 officers were intentionally killed last year, the highest number since the
9/11 attacks. That’s a 59 percent increase from the previous year. 133 officers
were shot in ambush style attacks, an increase of 123 percent over the previous
year.
The
most recent data shows that violent crime is rising across the country, but
violence against police officers is up even higher. This is a unique and
critical problem.
I’d
like to recognize one of my guests here today. Officer Zach Andersen was a
deputy in Grundy County last year when Sergeant Jim Smith of the Iowa State
Patrol was murdered in an ambush attack. He was with Sergeant Smith when the
murder happened. I previously spoke in honor of Sergeant Smith’s memory.
It
breaks my heart to hear stories like this come out of Iowa, but there’re sadly
many such stories around the country.
Every
death of an officer killed in the line of duty is a tragedy. It’s a tragedy for
the officer who sacrificed his or her life. It’s a tragedy for the family and
friends left behind. It’s a tragedy for the community that lost a public
servant. And it’s a tragedy for all of us who rely on these brave men and women
to keep us safe.
There’s
another disturbing trend that goes hand in hand with the rise in attacks on
police. We see more criminals resisting or fleeing arrest, more disrespect and
demonizing of law enforcement and a general atmosphere of hostility towards the
people in uniform who put their lives on the line to protect us.
This
is a growing crisis, and there’s much that Congress needs to do to help address
it.
One
of the challenges is a lack of data. While the government collects basic data
on attacks against police that result in serious injury or death, we don’t have
much data on the contributing factors. We also don’t have good data on attacks
against police that don’t result in death and serious injury.
For
this reason, I introduced the Improving
Law Enforcement Officer Safety and Wellness Through Data Act. This bill
will help expand our understanding of these attacks to better identify motives,
trends and any coordinated efforts to target those officers who put on the
badge to keep our communities safe.
I
worked with police groups including Major County Sheriffs of America and the
National Association of Police Organizations to identify gaps in reporting.
Senators Luján, Tillis, Hassan, and Cassidy are original cosponsors of this
bipartisan bill.
There
are several bills proposed by members of this Committee that would make it a
federal crime to attack law enforcement, and that would enhance penalties for
doing so. Senators Cornyn, Tillis and Cotton have sponsored these bills.
A
main cause of this violence against police is the demonization and disrespect
shown to the profession of law enforcement throughout the country. When you
allow hatred of a group to spread, people find it easy to justify violent
attacks against them.
Kathy
Smith, the wife of the late Sergeant Smith, sent us a letter that I’d like to
introduce into the record. She tells us about what a wonderful and
self-sacrificing man he was, but also that over the past six to eight years, he
told her that officers have been treated with more hostility.
She
writes that during the riots, “My husband stood with his tactical team
protecting the state capital in Iowa and had frozen water bottles and rocks
thrown at them. Protesters spit and insulted them for hours at a time.”
I
held a roundtable with Iowa law enforcement a couple of months ago, and one
theme that I heard constantly is officer recruitment and retention. There
aren’t enough police officers to go around. There are not enough young people
joining the profession. Most new hires they’re seeing come from other law
enforcement offices.
The
question that comes up is how we can ask young people to join a profession if
we do not take care of them. How can we ask them to protect us if we don’t
protect them? And if we don’t have enough officers, we can only expect to see
other violent crimes get worse and worse.
Kathy
Smith’s message to us here today is this, “You can allow culture’s diminishing
respect and police’s lack of protection to continue down this dark path,
permitting more families to face the same shattered fate as ours… or you can do
something about it. You can listen to the problems we have, develop a plan to
fix them, and save the lives of our officers.”
I
agree with her, and I hope this hearing will help to examine all the aspects of
this crisis for police and how we can help protect them.
Before
I close, I would also like to introduce a letter from the National Association
of Police Organizations, and also a statement from the Fraternal Order of
Police, which states that anti-police rhetoric – amplified by social media
platforms – leads to brazen acts of violence against law enforcement.
Thank
you to our witnesses for appearing today. We look forward to hearing from you.