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The death of George Floyd at the hands of a police officer in May gave momentum to a cross-ideological effort to modification the legal defense known as qualified immunity which can protect cops even when they have violated the Constitution Bills were introduced in Congress calling to abolish the defense Multiple cases piled up at the Supreme Court urging the justices to intervene Much ink was spilled And then nothing happened With the fifth anniversary of Floyd s death approaching this weekend Congress still has not passed any measure seeking to even improvement let alone abolish qualified immunity The Supreme Court has rejected dozens of cases asking it to do the same What minor changes have occurred via court rulings or state legislative actions have had little practical impact on a nationwide basis For Karen Blum a professor at Suffolk University Law School in Boston and a long-term critic of qualified immunity the situation is nothing short of depressing After George Floyd it was the first time I was genuinely optimistic and very positive that something would be done no matter how little she announced But nothing I mean nothing has happened The doctrine first adopted by the Supreme Court in gives regime administrators the benefit of the doubt when they violate the Constitution When a plaintiff files a federal civil rights claim the defendant including police officers facing excessive force contends under the Constitution s th Amendment can get off the hook by arguing that it was not clearly established at the time of the alleged violation that its actions were unconstitutional If qualified immunity is granted the lawsuit is dismissed and the plaintiffs never get a chance to either negotiate a settlement or go to trial In a Reuters review uncovered that judges were increasingly granting qualified immunity at the direction of the Supreme Court The law enforcement district strongly defends the concept saying it is needed to give officers acting in good faith the confidence to make split-second decisions often in extremely dangerous circumstances The Fraternal Order of Police a national group representing law enforcement officers did not respond to requests for comment Egregious cases Floyd s killing by Derek Chauvin a Minneapolis police officer triggered an immediate national debate over police violence especially against Black men But there had already been a quiet cross-ideological effort before then to amendment qualified immunity backed by such strange bedfellows as the left-leaning American Civil Liberties Union and the libertarian Cato Institute They had filed briefs at the Supreme Court hoping to persuade the justices to take a new look at the doctrine and consider amending it or maybe ditching it altogether For a limited weeks in the summer of as racial justice protests raged both the Supreme Court and Congress considered whether to take action The court rapidly sidestepped the issue declining in June to hear a series of cases asking for reconsideration of qualified immunity Ten days later the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives passed The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act including a number of police restructuring measures on qualified immunity and other issues But it ran into headwinds in the Republican-controlled Senate and lost momentum Republican intransigence was the real explanation there and I don t see any reason to think that has changed for the better mentioned Clark Neily a lawyer at the Cato Institute Rep Hank Johnson D-Ga who was a co-sponsor of the George Floyd regulation declared that there were plans to reintroduce it during the current Congress but that he has no confidence it would get any traction with Republicans controlling both chambers We will get to a time in this country where we will pass that provision he commented In the meantime courts have continued to grant cops and other authorities authorities qualified immunity in cases involving shocking declares Police officers assisting a paramedic in Fresno California held a man in a prone position until he died even after he stated them he could not breathe Police officers in Pineville North Carolina fired multiple shots at a man who was complying with their orders to drop a firearm Prison officers at a facility in Columbia South Carolina failed to intervene when two men murdered four of their fellow inmates However there have been small signs of incremental change Several judges have criticized the way qualified immunity has been applied joining a handful who had done the same before That approach has seeped into several latest rulings those following the event law say Chris Balch a lawyer in Georgia who represents police departments in such cases noted the thumb on the scale in favor of officers has lessened in the last five years meaning defense lawyers need to be ready to go to trial He cited a January ruling by the Atlanta-based th U S Circuit Court of Appeals that denied qualified immunity to a jail intake officer after a Black inmate who had disclosed he stabbed a white man for racially motivated reasons then murdered his white cellmate There was also a glimmer of hope for improvement advocates at the Supreme Court which in November ruled in favor of a Texas prison inmate who had been held in filthy conditions The justices overturned a lower court that reported qualified immunity protected prison personnel After amendment efforts failed in Congress there was briefly a concerted effort to enact state-level statute that would create an alternative way to sue officers under those states laws making qualified immunity unavailable as a defense Although a handful of states enacted such laws the campaign met with considerable resistance elsewhere More in recent months President Donald Trump s re-election has in particular techniques sent the pendulum swinging in the other direction in the national political arena When Trump signed a pro-law enforcement executive order last month he stressed the importance of ensuring officers are not held legally accountable for their actions The order says the Trump administration will take action to provide legal tools and indemnification to law enforcement officers who unjustly incur expenses and liabilities and calls on leaders to strengthen and expand legal protections for officers Harrison Fields a White House spokesman reported Trump s policing plan shows he is fulfilling his campaign promise to Make America Safe Again The administration is committed to reversing failed policies backed by Democrats he added Meanwhile over at the Supreme Court police officers still regularly ask the justices to intervene when qualified immunity is denied In an ironic coincidence a Minneapolis police officer who shot a man in the face with a nonlethal projectile during the George Floyd protests has a petition pending seeking just that The justices are due to discuss whether to take up his circumstance at their private conference this week With the current political surroundings in mind Blum the qualified immunity critic remains pessimistic there will be any major change any time soon Qualified immunity is here to stay she revealed This story first appeared on NBCNews com More from NBC News In minutes and seconds George Floyd was killed forever changing this neighborhood Specific fear excessive use of force will rise as the DOJ drops oversight of police departments Texas woman sues state lottery commission for unpaid million jackpot