by Paul Bedard, Washington Secrets Columnist
The police union that represents the U.S. Park Police today called on the Interior secretary to dump her chief spokesman for his online posting of anti-law enforcement rage.
The Fraternal Order of Police said in a letter provided to Secrets that Interior Secretary Deb Haaland must demand the resignation of Tyler Cherry “immediately” for his past postings that also include promotion of anti-Trump propaganda.
“While Mr. Cherry is entitled to hold and express extremist, dogmatic views about law enforcement, these statements clearly disqualify him from holding such an important position near the very top of our agency. The Department of Interior employs roughly 3,000 federal law enforcement officers and while I only speak on behalf of the 350 who are members of the USPPFOP, I can assure you that we are all deeply troubled by his leadership position in our chain of command,” said Kenneth Spencer, chairman of the U.S. Park Police Fraternal Order of Police.
“For all of these reasons, and in a plea for you to reassure your law Fraternal Order of Police-United States Park Police Labor Committee enforcement officers that you reject hateful and dangerous anti-police rhetoric, I urge you to demand Mr. Cherry’s resignation immediately,” added Spencer.
According to the union and recent reports, Cherry has accused police broadly of brutality and linked them to slaveholders.
In other posts, he boosted the anti-Trump Russiagate hoax.
Interior had no immediate comment.
Cherry is a former spokesman for President Joe Biden and the principal deputy communications director and spokesman for Interior and Haaland.
While some news sites and social media critics have focused on Cherry’s same-sex marriage to a Navy specialist and promotion of LGBT issues, the union cited only his criticism of police as far back as the 2015 death of Freddie Gray while in the custody of Baltimore police.
“Praying for #Baltimore, but praying even harder for an end to a capitalistic police state motivated by explicit and implicit racial biases,” Cherry posted in 2015, according to Fox Digital.
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Spencer cited other postings including these comments:
- “Police often don’t respond to violence, but rather incite it.”
- “The modern police system is a direct evolution of slave patrols and lynch mobs.”
- “Police brutality is state-sanctioned.”
- “Abolish ICE.”
Spencer wrote, “If Mr. Cherry is comfortable making such offensive statements in a public forum, I shudder to think about the views he must share privately within the halls of the DOI surrounded by decision makers who help steer the wheels of democracy. It is hardly unreasonable for officers to bear suspicions that such views are rooted in, and cultivated by, the years of DOI neglect of the US Park Police.”