Detroit police chief fires back at Rashida Tlaib over racist suggestion to use only black analysts

Detroit Police Chief James Craig fired back at Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) this week after she told the chief that only black analysts should be used to monitor the Detroit Police Department's facial recognition system.

"Analysts need to be African Americans, not people that are not," she told Craig on Monday. "I think non-African Americans think African Americans all look the same."

The controversial freshman lawmaker's comments were made during a tour of the Detroit Police Department's Real Time Crime Center, which uses live camera footage and facial recognition software to identify wanted criminals across Detroit.

Speaking with Fox News host Tucker Carlson on Thursday, Craig called Tlaib's suggestion "disturbing" and "delusional."

"It's disturbing — delusional. There's nothing to it," Craig said. "The key points that keep getting missed in the conversation of facial recognition is we understand that the technology is flawed. We have built-in safeguards, and I can't speak for other police departments, but the safeguards are we have trained analysts — professionals — and then it's peer-reviewed by yet a second analyst and then, only after that, does the supervisor come in and concur with their findings."

"What the congresswoman misses, she never talks about the victims and the cases that we've solved, some pretty big cases involving mass murder suspects," Craig continued. "It's almost as if, 'Well does it really matter?' It's a deflection and it's constant."

Craig likened Tlaib's suggestion to saying that "a white police officer cannot work in an African-American community."

"Her statement was based on nothing," Craig said.