Wieden & Kennedy lends creative weight to police accountability campaign

Wieden & Kennedy is supporting Campaign Zero, a campaigning organization that aims to take apart police union contracts and officers' employee bills of rights.

Campaign Zero worked with the agency’s New York office on a campaign to Nix the 6, which are six frequent ways the group sees police departments protecting themselves from scrutiny.

Wieden & Kennedy created billboards, which are going up in Chicago, and a series of videos to drive people to the Nixthe6.org site and work toward changing internal police procedures.

The videos, a one-minute spot and series of 30-second ads will roll out over Instagram in the coming weeks. They feature close-ups of actual police contracts with highlighted passages that reveal how disciplinary actions and bad behavior are often buffered from the public, potentially keeping rogue officers in place.

The spots are designed in the style of ripped-from-the-headlines, negative ads for political campaigns.

In Baton Rouge, for example, sexual misconduct records are thrown out after a year. The one-minute video asks: “Why does Minneapolis give officers paid leave when they kill people? Why does Portland require that officers be disciplined in the way ‘least likely to embarrass them?’”

Campaign Zero positions itself as a “police reform organization led by activists, protestors and researchers.” The group was co-founded by DeRay Mckesson, an early vocal supporter of Black Lives Matter, and Sam Sinyangwe.

Mckesson is also part of Crooked Media, which was founded by a group of former Obama-administration officials. Sinyangwe, a member of Movement for Black Lives, hosts Crooked’s podcast, Pod Save the People, alongside Mckesson.

“There’s already a heightened awareness about the dangerous power of police unions. According to recent polling, the majority of Americans support ending the Officers’ Bill of Rights,” said Sinyangwe, in a statement. “With increased public awareness surrounding police unions’ influence, we can come together and hold these organizations accountable.”

Wieden & Kennedy donated its services, along with billboard company Van Wagner in Chicago. YouGov donated research services. The agency is negotiating to find airtime on other outlets, besides Campaign Zero’s Instagram account, to run the videos.