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"Congress cannot afford to let this moment pass," Joshua Bolten,
the president and chief executive of The Business Roundtable
group, said in a statement on Wednesday.
"There is room for bipartisan agreement on many critical issues
of policing reform, but the issues will be resolved only in
negotiations between the House and Senate," the statement added.
The development comes amid demonstrations against police
brutality following the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black
man killed after a police officer knelt on his neck for nearly
nine minutes while detaining him in Minneapolis.
The group urged Congress to bring about more transparency and
accountability in the reforms including establishing a 'National
Police Misconduct Registry' to maintain disciplinary records of
police officers.
It also called for federal minimum standards for policing,
including on use of lethal and non-lethal force, adding that
training programs for the police should be made more robust.
"There is no question that businesses can – and should – play a
role in addressing the systemic inequities that Black Americans
as well as other people of color face when it comes to policing
in our nation today," said Walmart Chief Executive Officer Doug
McMillon, who is the chairman of Business Roundtable.
AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson, also a part of the group, said
corporate America cannot stay silent on the issue of racial
inequality and should play its part.
(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Bengaluru and David Shepardson
in Washington; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila)
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