Derek Chauvin is found guilty. What now?

America had awaited the verdict of the Derek Chauvin trial with all the sobriety and faith in the legal process we had come to expect, meaning near hysteria across the land and the media rushing to make premature judgements.

That meant cities preparing for a possible acquittal and rumours circulating that the National Guard was about to be called out across all 50 states. In the end, there was no need. The jury took just twelve hours – considered no time at all – to reach guilty verdicts on two charges of second and third-degree murder and one charge of manslaughter. In eight weeks, when the sentencing is expected, Derek Chauvin probably won’t face the 40 years in prison which is the theoretical upper limit, but he is certain to face enough time to underline the severity of his crime but also the damage done to race relations across America.

It will also reflect, of course, something broader; that degree of psychological torment the trial precipitated across a nation. Even Saturday Night Live, a show whose talented cast are regularly undermined by less talented writing, caught this peculiar paranoid zeitgeist over the weekend. In a skit about local Minnesota news, four presenters debated the trial. It made for an astute but cynical cold opening as the two white hosts offered platitudes about Chauvin’s guilt.

“Sounds like there’s no way that Derek Chauvin walks away from this,” concluded Kate McKinnon, only for the two black hosts, Kenan Thompson and Ego Nwodim, to demur. Citing the prosecution’s attempts to cloud the waters by citing George Floyd’s drug use, Thompson suggested: “it was a clear act of desperation to create doubt where there is none.”

“There’s no way the jury’s falling for that…” agreed the white hosts.

“I’m not saying that…”, replies Thompson before leading the skit into the politics around the trial and race relations in America. It was rambling, confused, contradictory, wildly illogical, and often depressingly cynical, and therefore totally representative of real-world politics.

Before the verdict came down, Maxine Waters, a likeable, earnest, but predictably undisciplined member of the Democrats’ more cantankerous caucus, had already prejudiced the trial by telling protestors to “stay on the street and we’ve got to get more active, we’ve got to get more confrontational. We’ve got to make sure that they know that we mean business.” Her remarks led the trial’s judge, Peter Cahill, to reflect “I wish elected officials would stop talking about this case, especially in a manner that’s disrespectful to the rule of law and to the judicial branch and our function.” It got more damning as the judge told Chauvin’s defence that “Congresswoman Waters may have given you something on appeal that may result in this whole trial being overturned.”

It’s doubtful there’ll be any consequences to Waters’ words – Republicans demonise her more than her influence warrants but it hinders the Democrats’ cause by offering such an easy target.

In the end, the verdict was predictable when it arrived. It was always going to be hard for any jury to ignore the powerful video of the former officer kneeling on Floyd’s neck as well as the testimony of law enforcement professionals who had spoken about Chauvin’s use of excessive force.

Yet the ramifications are still hard to anticipate. Certainly, there was the usual excess of naïve optimism around the celebrations that followed the verdict. Journalists asking George Floyd’s girlfriend, Courteney Ross, to predict the socio-legal consequences of the verdict might make for good television but it’s really only that. Others spoke of a new sense of reality, as though the problem of police violence towards the black communities hasn’t been one of those pressing, impossible-to-ignore issues around which American politicians work so hard to look the other way. Just as every spree shooting is followed by days of prayers and promises to do something, the debate around police violence towards black citizens usually descends into impotent verbiage. Entropy exists not just in the physical world but the political too. Everything cools. Time’s arrow points towards forgetfulness.

That doesn’t mean, however, that the short-term ramifications of Chauvin’s conviction won’t be real. There has already been a move in many police departments to stop using chokeholds. Others are likely to follow but whether this will go further is much less likely. Democrats have already passed a “George Floyd Justice in Policing Act” through the House but the pull to reach the required 60 votes to get it through the Senate will be a difficult one. Even then, the legislation is carefully worded around the limitations of the federal response.

Whilst each of the Act’s proposals around federal law enforcement is clear cut – the requirement of federal officials to wear body cameras, for example – those around state and local law enforcement are limited to those funded by the federal government. In other words, America’s politics exists in both federal and state legislatures and, as much as Joe Biden might push for reform, his power ends at the doors of any state building run by Republicans who remain paralysed by their historic ties to law and order, as well as an electorate who might view race relations quite differently.

Yet perhaps cynicism should be reserved for another day. History teaches us that not all meaningful moments end up forgotten in history. Some bring about real change. George Floyd’s death might yet be more of a Rosa Parks moment than, say, Rodney King’s beating. America might change considerably for the better. Just don’t be too surprised if it doesn’t.