 | Christine T. Nguyen | MPR News
June 24, 2020
'Chauvin knew what he was doing': Minneapolis police chief says George Floyd didn't have to die | |
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Good morning and welcome to the middle of the week. Here’s what you need to know today.
Isolated showers and thunderstorms in much of the state. That includes the Twin Cities, where highs are in the upper 70s. Statewide, central and southern Minnesota have the best chance of storms. Highs from 70 to 80 across the state, cooling off to the upper 40s and upper 50s at night. More on Updraft | Forecast
The Minneapolis police chief says Floyd's killing didn't happen due to a lack of training. Medaria Arradondo said his department has training designed to teach officers how to arrest and restrain suspects so that they can still breathe. Derek Chauvin and Tou Thao both completed the training. “The training was there,” Arradondo said in a statement Monday. “Chauvin knew what he was doing.”
Meanwhile, Bob Kroll has broken his silence, but he didn’t say much at all. The controversial Minneapolis police union head gave an interview to CBS News yesterday morning, following that up with a string of other outlets, including MPR News. Among the takeaways: Kroll isn’t going anywhere and he believes now is time for stable union leadership.
Kroll and other union leaders say they won’t challenge the firing of Derek Chauvin. He’s the officer whose knee on George Floyd’s neck killed him. As for the other three officers involved, the union says it will wait until investigations are complete.
COVID-19 deaths are approaching 1,400, but the death rate is slowing. In addition, the number of hospitalizations and intensive care cases remained stable yesterday, despite a slight uptick on Monday.
Here are the latest coronavirus statistics:
- 33,469 cases confirmed (245 new) via 520,045 tests
- 1,393 deaths (9 new)
- 3,860 cases requiring hospitalization
- 339 people remain hospitalized; 158 in intensive care
- 29,399 patients no longer needing isolation
Many schools planning for next fall are overwhelmed by the potential cost of socially distanced education. Money for protective equipment, staff to accommodate smaller class sizes and more buses to keep kids spread out on their way to school are among the costly new requirements, the AP reports. And urban, under-resourced districts are facing particularly large challenges.
Let's end on a bit of politics...
Late on the final night of the special legislative session, Democrats piled on police reform measures that Republicans wouldn’t do, which led to a stalemate. At least, that’s how Paul Gazelka, the Republican Senate majority leader, tells it. He told MPR News that his party tried working with Dems on a number of matters, but they asked for too much.
Gazelka says he expects another special session, too. However, he said it’ll only happen if Gov. Tim Walz ends his emergency declaration over COVID-19. Gazelka says coronavirus is serious, but not as bad as expected, so he’s calling on the emergency to end.
— Cody Nelson, MPR News | @codyleenelson |
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