SPOKANE, Wash. —
The clocktower in downtown Spokane was covered with blue on Saturday afternoon.
Blue flags, blue shirts and blue signs. "Back the Blue" members held a "Support Law Enforcement" rally to honor local police officers.
A few officers seemed stunned by the several hundred attendees. Most of the officers just felt grateful.
“We become police officers because we want to help,” Spokane Police Leuitant Matthew Cowles said. “So for our community to come out and show us support means a lot for us.”
He has never had this many people thank him for his work, he said.
“People coming up to me while I’m working and thanking me for what I do and saying they hope I go home to my family soon, I really appreciate that,” he said. “I hear it more now than ever before.”
Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich is looking at the event with a more critical eye.
“What this means to me is the community has bonded together and decided that basically enough's enough,” he said.
Enough of the anti-police sentiment, he means. Police officers nationwide are facing backlash over police brutality, particularly related to the killings of unarmed Black men and women.
“You can’t say a good hundred thousand people that wear a badge and have served you all these years, are all racists,” Knezovich added. “We’re not racist.”
Some people in the community are calling to defund the police, something that angers supporters. But Cowles says he understands.
“I think the Defund the Police is a movement from our community, from groups that maybe the police department, law enforcement hasn't connected well with or hasn't been sympathetic to their needs,” he said. “And so because of that, there's mistrust and misunderstanding.”