Minneapolis council members pledge to disband police as protests mount

A majority of city council members in Minneapolis have pledged to abolish the city’s police department after the death of an unarmed black man in custody last month led to some of the biggest protests seen in the United States.

“A veto-proof majority of the MPLS City Council just publicly agreed that the Minneapolis Police Department is not reformable and that we’re going to end the current policing system,” Alondra Cano, a member of the Minneapolis council, said on Twitter.

Council members said such reforms would be a long, complex process and provided little detail on the way forward.

In press statements, Minneapolis City Council president Lisa Bender “the idea of having no police department is certainly not in the short term.”