Last month, criminal justice reform became an issue in the 2020 presidential elections in a manner befitting the Trump era: through a series of tweets from the president on Memorial Day insulting his potential Democratic rivals.
Trump first declared that anyone associated with the 1994 Crime Bill, the sweeping legislation known for exacerbating mass incarceration, was “unelectable.” He then pronounced himself to be “responsible for criminal justice reform” because he signed the FIRST STEP Act into law, even though some of the most ardent supporters of the federal sentencing and prison reform bill say the legislation is but an incremental step.
The above excerpt was originally published in USA Today.
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