Patricia R. Doxsey reports in The Daily Freeman that last week President Donald Trump "joked" that it’s OK for police officers to rough up people who have been arrested. Local law-enforcement officials told Doxsey that those comments are not being taken seriously by officers. “I think that was just a figure of speech,” said Dutchess County Sheriff Adrian “Butch” Anderson, who served as the co-chairman of Trump’s New York transition team. Ulster County Sheriff Paul VanBlarcum, who met Trump at the White House in May, also said the president was “joking around” and that the comments have been taken, “totally out of context.... He wasn’t encouraging police brutality,” VanBlarcum said. “No police officer took that as saying it the way the media sensationalized it.” Saugerties Police Chief Joseph Sinagra said, “I don’t honestly believe police officers would look at these comments and think that its a signal to mistreat the public.... If any of my police officers think that’s it’s a green light to mistreat the public, they will find themselves unemployed.... When we’re in the midst of trying to rebuild trust in the community, comments like that don’t just detract from the conversation, they make us go backwards rather than forward.” Read the full story in The Daily Freeman.