By MES Dispatch Staff
The Briefing
- Omaha Public Schools Superintendent Matthew Ray requested Tuesday that school resource officers stop using electric shock gloves known as G.L.O.V.E. in district middle and high schools.
- The decision follows public backlash after the Associated Press first reported ICE’s plan to acquire similar gloves for its officers; Omaha police had used the devices twice during the 2025-26 school year.
- About 30 residents and school board members spoke against the gloves at a school board meeting; no one spoke in favor.
- Mayor John Ewing Jr. said police have honored the district’s request to “opt out,” and officers will continue carrying tasers, batons, OC spray and firearms.
- Most of the Omaha Police Department’s 34 school resource officers had been trained to use the gloves, which the department purchased for about $66,000 in 2025.
OMAHA, Neb. — Police officers at Omaha’s largest public school district will no longer use electric shock gloves after the superintendent asked to halt the program this week, Mayor John Ewing Jr. said.
Omaha Public Schools Superintendent Matthew Ray requested Tuesday that school resource officers stop using the devices, known as G.L.O.V.E., or Generated Low Output Voltage Emitter. Ray said at a school board meeting Monday and in a letter to the district community that he had only learned of the gloves the previous week, ahead of the district’s Wednesday start of school.
The request followed public scrutiny after the Associated Press reported that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement planned to acquire the same devices for its officers. The Omaha Police Department had held a news conference the previous week demonstrating the gloves, saying they achieved compliance with little to no force. Police said the gloves were used twice during the 2025-26 school year: once to stop a student from fleeing after a fight with a security guard, and once on a student who threw a chair and punched a security guard.
About 30 residents and school board members spoke against continued use of the gloves at Monday’s meeting, with no one speaking in favor. Ray said the district recognizes the important role school resource officers play in school safety, but that continued use of the gloves “would be counterproductive to our work together.”
Ewing said police have agreed to honor the district’s decision to opt out of the program, and officers will continue to carry tasers, batons, OC spray and firearms. Most of the department’s 34 school resource officers had been trained and authorized to use the gloves. Omaha’s police department signed a roughly $66,000 contract in 2025 for 40 of the gloves, manufactured by Compliant Technologies LLC.
Police Chief Todd Schmaderer and Ewing said in a joint statement that the department considers the gloves “the safest use-of-force option in the rare times when it is used.” It was not immediately known whether other school districts have used the devices.