The Justice Department formally moved to withdraw from court-approved consent decrees with the Minneapolis Police Department and Louisville Metro Police Department on May 21, 2025, ending federal oversight programs established following the police killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor. Attorney General Pam Bondi said the decrees reflected the 'previous administration's overreach' and that local police departments were best governed by their communities. These facts are confirmed by Fox News, NPR, CNN, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, and the Louisville Courier Journal.

The Minneapolis consent decree had been negotiated under the Biden administration and approved by a federal court in January 2024, requiring sweeping reforms to MPD's use-of-force policies, crisis intervention training, and data collection. The Louisville decree, similarly negotiated after the March 2020 killing of Breonna Taylor by LMPD officers, covered nearly identical reform areas. Both decrees had assigned independent monitors to track compliance.

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and Minneapolis City Council expressed opposition to the withdrawal, saying the city had already invested significant resources to implement reforms required by the decree and intended to continue them voluntarily. Louisville officials had a more mixed response, with some saying the local community could monitor the department more effectively than federal monitors.

NPR and CNN reported that the withdrawals were part of a broader pattern — the DOJ also signaled it would drop consent decree negotiations with cities including Phoenix, Louisville, and the Louisiana State Police. Fox News and Breitbart framed the withdrawals as ending Biden-era federal micromanagement of local police departments that had contributed to officer demoralization and rising crime in some cities. Civil rights groups said the loss of court-enforceable reform requirements removed the most powerful tool for sustained accountability.