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Policing has become the nexus for adjudicating questions of racism and racial justice for historical and structural reasons. The historical process relates to the replacement of social welfare with social warfare as a model for managing the black poor in particular after the 60s.
Structurally, investment in police actually became a way to formally assert color-blind justice while amplifying the racializing power of criminal stigma as when the Kenosha Sheriff says he doesn't care what race wink wink, but criminal elements should be warehoused, eliminated.
Policing is also the main terrain of a worsening conflict over the lack of constituent power. The slogan to abolish or defund is about removing illegitimate coercive force, but the counter-party claims a right to police as a foundation of sovereign right. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/aug/27/white-supremacists-militias-infiltrate-us-police-report
The way police authority is already constituted means that this is not an even contest, as I argued here, and therein lies the enormous danger in this moment:
I address this range of issues from different angles here: https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520318304/race-and-americas-long-war
