Advocates Condemn Bill To Remove State Police From Attorney General's Office

By Dana DiFilippo, New Jersey Monitor

July 7, 2025

Progressive groups are rallying around New Jersey Attorney General Matt Platkin after legislators moved last month to take the state police from his control.

Advocates from eight grassroots groups Wednesday denounced bipartisan legislation that would make the New Jersey State Police — now a division under the state Department of Law and Public Safety, which Platkin heads — its own department answerable directly to the governor.

They criticized the bill’s timing, coming as “federal law enforcement and judicial practices have become politically weaponized under an increasingly authoritarian Trump administration.”

“This misguided legislative effort could not come at a worse time, as we can no longer expect the U.S. Department of Justice to serve as a backstop to hold state police accountable for discriminatory conduct,” said Jim Sullivan, interim policy director of the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey. “New Jerseyans – and all people who enter our state – deserve better.”

Antoinette Miles, who heads the New Jersey Working Families Party, urged legislative leaders and Gov. Phil Murphy to reject the bill.

“At a time when our civil rights are under attack from Donald Trump and extreme Republicans in Washington, we need our elected officials in Trenton to be working with General Platkin more closely than ever to ensure that New Jerseyans’ rights are protected,” Miles said. “This dangerous bill, the apparent product of a political vendetta, threatens to erode the progress we have made.”

Other groups blasting the bill Wednesday included New Jersey Citizen Action, Make the Road NJ, New Jersey Institute for Social Justice, New Jersey Policy Perspective and the Latino Action Network.

Tensions have increasingly grown between the state police — the largest police force statewide with 3,000 members — and Platkin, whose office investigates fatal police encounters, oversees police licensing, and publicly reports on police major discipline and use of force. The office issued two scathing reports last fall on racism in the agency’s hiring and promotions, which renewed civil rights leaders’ calls for a clean sweep of its top brass.

Such investigations are why Platkin should retain oversight, said the Rev. Charles Boyer, founder of Salvation and Social Justice.

“The New Jersey State Police has a long, well-documented history of racism embedded in their culture,” Boyer said. “To allow them to separate from the oversight of the Attorney General’s office is not just irresponsible — it’s an assault on the Black community. Their record with Black people is abominable, and if the legislature permits this, it will echo the same disregard for justice we see under the Trump administration.”

Spokespeople for the state police did not respond to a request for comment, and a Platkin spokesman declined to comment.

Lawmakers pushing the bill have cited the attorney general’s lack of law enforcement experience, interference with the ability of police do their jobs and tedious bureaucracy in the attorney general’s office, among other concerns.

The legislation does have some tentative initial support from the NAACP New Jersey State Conference.

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