Reuters US Domestic News Summary

Following is a summary of current US domestic news briefs. Hard hit New York City begins reopening as coronavirus infection rate plummets

Exactly 100 days after the first coronavirus case was confirmed in New York City, some workers began returning to jobs on Monday at the start of reopening from a citywide shutdown to battle the epidemic that killed nearly 22,000 of its residents. People who had been staying home for months boarded subways and buses as the most populous U.S. city began Phase One of its hopeful journey toward economic recovery. Cuomo says New York set to overhaul criminal justice practices following protests

After days of protests over racial injustice triggered by the Minneapolis police killing of George Floyd, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo on Monday said state lawmakers were set to enact a criminal justice overhaul that could become a model for the United States. Cuomo said he and legislative leaders reached agreement over the weekend on a package of bills designed to curb police abuses, including one banning officers from using the so-called chokehold on suspects. Biden faces balancing act as activists call to 'defund the police'

Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden opposes "defunding the police," his campaign said on Monday, declining to embrace a rallying cry that has gained support among progressive activists and protesters demonstrating against police brutality. The growing calls to dismantle or reimagine U.S. police departments have put pressure on Biden and other Democratic leaders, who favor policing reforms but are wary of adopting a loaded phrase that some Democrats fear could be a divisive election issue. Black business owners on Washington's historic U Street see echoes of 1968

For the owners of some of the venerable black-owned businesses on U Street in Washington's Northwest section, the protests against racism and police brutality that have flared on the streets of the U.S. capital seem like an echo of the past. Rioting that erupted in April 1968 in Washington and many other U.S. cities after the assassination of civil rights leader Martin Luther King inflicted scars on the neighborhood that lasted decades. Democrats pledge transformative change with police reform bill

U.S. congressional Democrats unveiled sweeping legislation on Monday to combat police violence and racial injustice, two weeks after George Floyd's death in Minneapolis police custody sparked nationwide protests. The 134-page bill would take numerous steps, including allowing victims of misconduct to sue police for damages, ban chokeholds, require the use of body cameras by federal law enforcement officers, restrict lethal force, and facilitate independent investigations of police departments that show patterns of misconduct. Mourners pay tribute to George Floyd as pressure mounts for U.S. police reform

Hundreds of mourners streamed into a Texas church on Monday to honor African American George Floyd, who died in police custody two weeks ago, as pressure mounted in Congress and across the United States for sweeping reforms to the justice system. Demonstrators' anger over the May 25 death of Floyd, 46, is giving way to a growing determination to make his case a turning point in race relations and a lightning rod for change in the way police departments function across the country. Bail raised to $1.25 million for former police officer in George Floyd death

Bail for the white former Minneapolis police officer charged with murdering African American George Floyd, whose death ignited two weeks of protests, was raised by $250,000 to $1.25 million at a hearing on Monday. Former officer Derek Chauvin, 44, has been charged with second- and third-degree murder and manslaughter in Floyd's May 25 death in Minneapolis by kneeling on his neck for nearly nine minutes. Trump insists no police defunding amid U.S.-wide clamor for reforms

President Donald Trump on Monday pledged to maintain funding for police departments in the United States amid growing calls for sweeping cuts to law enforcement budgets as protesters clamored for an end to police brutality following the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis last month. "There won't be defunding, there won't be dismantling of our police," Trump told a roundtable of state, federal, and local law enforcement officials at the White House on Monday. "We want to make sure we don't have any bad actors in there ... but 99 percent ... of them are great great people and have done jobs that are record setting." Biden's 'compassion' meant world to Floyd family: lawyer

Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden showed compassion that "meant the world" to George Floyd's family on Monday, according to a lawyer for relatives of the unarmed black man who died in police custody. Biden met with Floyd's relatives in Houston for more than an hour, said lawyer Benjamin Crump, who posted a picture of himself on Twitter after the meeting with Biden, Floyd's uncle Roger, civil rights activist Reverend Al Sharpton and Representative Cedric Richmond. Minneapolis council members see community programs as replacement for police

Four Minneapolis City Council members in favor of dismantling the city's police department on Monday outlined broad plans to shift funding to community-based programs that reduce violence and limit the need for an armed law enforcement response. Council Member Jeremiah Ellison told a media call that it could take a year to discuss reforms with the public and come up with "an entirely new apparatus for public safety" to replace the Minneapolis Police Department.