Donald Trump’s administration has shut down the National Law Enforcement Accountability Database, a nationwide database tracking misconduct by federal police. This database was created in response to the murder of George Floyd in 2020 and was designed to prevent bad police officers from jumping to new agencies with clean records ¹.
The database, launched in December 2023, contained disciplinary records from all 90 executive branch agencies with law enforcement officers, dating back to 2017. It included information on nearly 150,000 federal officers and agents from the FBI, IRS, and other agencies ¹.
Trump’s executive order, signed on January 20, revoked dozens of Biden’s executive orders, citing the need to remove “unpopular, inflationary, illegal, and radical practices” from federal agencies. The order also aimed to expand protections for judges, prosecutors, and law enforcement officers ².
The Justice Department and the White House have declined to explain their reasoning for decommissioning the database. However, some police advocacy groups had criticized the database, arguing that officers were not given the chance to challenge the information about them before it was entered ¹.
The removal of the database has sparked concerns about accountability and transparency within law enforcement agencies. Critics argue that this move will make it more difficult to track police misconduct and ensure that officers are held accountable for their actions.