Americans could lose police protection unless they 'start showing respect' to police, Attorney General Barr says

Civil liberties experts say Trump administration's top cop is 'telling communities across the country to bow their heads'

In a speech to law enforcement officials, US Attorney General William Barr warned that Americans could risk losing police protection if they don't "start showing" the "respect and support that law enforcement deserves".

Mr Barr delivered remarks during the third annual award ceremony for the Distinguished Service in Policing, which recognised 19 officers and deputies from 12 jurisdictions from across the US.

"I think today, American people have to focus on something else, which is the sacrifice and the service that is given by our law enforcement officers," Mr Barr said in his remarks. "And they have to start showing, more than they do, the respect and support that law enforcement deserves. And if communities don't give that support and respect, they might find themselves without the police protection they need."

The Attorney General's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment asking for clarification about his remarks.

Mr Barr also compared law enforcement officers to war veterans "who bore the brunt of people who were opposed to the war", adding. "The respect and gratitude owed to them was not given."

Sherilynn Ifill, president of the NAACP's Legal Defence and Educational Fund, called his statements "appalling" and "unacceptable".

Jeffery Robinson, deputy legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), said Mr Barr's comments equate to "telling communities across the country to bow their heads in respect to police even if those same police are violating their rights and killing people without justification."

Mr Barr echoed several speeches promoting a "tough on crime" stance as America's top cop under Donald Trump's Department of Justice.

In August, he told the Fraternal Order of Police — the country's largest police union, with 346,000 members — that there should be a "zero tolerance for resisting police".

He also has condemned bipartisan criminal justice reform efforts and called progressive prosecutors "demoralising to law enforcement and dangerous to public safety".

Mr Barr warned of an "emergence in some of our large cities of district attorneys that style themselves as 'social justice' reformers, who spend their time undercutting the police, letting criminals off the hook and refusing to enforce the law".

His speech followed police union criticism of reform efforts as a "war on cops" amid a Black Lives Matter movement seeking accountability for the police killings of African Americans as well as criminal investigations into corrupt law enforcement agencies.

Mr Barr also has supported efforts to retool or remove federal consent decrees that aim to reform law enforcement agencies charged with civil rights violations — judgments that the ACLU says are "vital to bringing state and local government officials in compliance with the US Constitution and civil rights laws the Department is authorised to enforce".