Police misconduct is real and should be prosecuted. Every unjustified use of force is a tragedy. But the claim that policing is systemically racist doesn't hold up when you examine the data carefully.

Harvard economist Roland Fryer, who is Black, conducted one of the most rigorous studies of police use of force. His 2016 study, using data from 10 major police departments, found no racial bias in police shootings — he called it 'the most surprising result of my career.' While he did find some disparities in non-lethal uses of force, the lethal force data showed no bias.

The Washington Post's database of fatal police shootings shows that in 2023, police shot about 1,096 people. Approximately 24% were Black, while Black Americans are about 13% of the population. That looks disproportionate until you consider that according to the FBI's Uniform Crime Reports, Black Americans commit approximately 52% of homicides and a disproportionate share of violent crimes. Police encounters track crime rates, and crime rates, not racism, drive the disparity.

A 2019 study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by researchers at Michigan State and the University of Maryland found that 'the race of the officer doesn't matter when it comes to predicting whether Black or white citizens are shot.' Black and Hispanic officers were just as likely to shoot Black suspects as white officers were.

Here's the cruel irony: the people most harmed by anti-police sentiment are Black Americans. After the 'Ferguson effect' and subsequent depolicing, murder rates spiked in major cities. Chicago homicides went from 411 in 2014 to 769 in 2016. The overwhelming majority of those additional victims were Black. A study estimated that the depolicing movement may have resulted in 2,000 additional Black homicide victims per year.

Black communities consistently poll in favor of the same or more police presence — not less. They want better policing, not no policing.