Criminal Justice Reform Is Imminent. Here’s Why

Van Jones may joke that he’s been an African American “for a very long time,” but it’s impossible for him to ignore the serious racial inequalities in the U.S. criminal justice system. With blacks incarcerated at six times the rates as Caucasians for the same crime, the multi-hyphen Jones co-founded the organization #Cut50, which works to reduce the prison population by 50 percent in the next decade.
During an exclusive interview with NationSwell, Jones discussed how the fight for reform is progressing and which 2016 presidential candidates are mostly likely to bring about change within the criminal justice system.
How has your organization #Cut50 participated in the [criminal justice reform] debate?
“I hosted a summit in March with Newt Gingrich — he and I became friends working together on CNN — and we thought, if we work really hard, we could get 100 people together for an hour, leaders from both sides, to talk about this issue. We got 700 people for seven hours, including 10 members of Congress, three governors, two Cabinet secretaries and a video from the president.
“Out of that summit, three bills were introduced and a channel was opened up between Koch Industries and the White House — mortal enemies, but not on this one issue. On JusticeReformNow.org, we collected 120,000 signatures from people saying Congress and the president should work together to get something done this year. We’ve worked as effectively as the other groups — the Coalition for Public Safety, ACLU, the Drug Policy Alliance or FAMM, Families Against Mandatory Minimums. We’re working very hard, and we’re very proud of what we’ve been able to accomplish.”
In Washington, #Cut50 is lobbying for the SAFE Justice Act. What would that legislation do?
“The most important thing is letting judges be judges again. We so overreacted to the crack epidemic in the 1980s; we stripped judges of their right to judge and instead imposed mandatory minimum sentences. Even if you’re someone caught with drugs because you were forced to by a boyfriend who was threatening your life or you had never made any mistake before, a judge couldn’t say, ‘Well, look, the punishment should fit the crime here.’ In all circumstances, they just rubber stamped it and would give you some atrocious sentence. You can get 25 years for shooting a cop and 30 years for a non-violent drug offense. That’s the kind of thing that this legislation begins to address.”
READ MORE: 7 States Making Bold Criminal Justice Reforms
Even though Congress is talking about criminal justice reform, it doesn’t seem like the presidential candidates are giving it much attention, with a couple exceptions like Rand Paul. Why is that?
“They’re talking about reform more in this election than any other in American history. Even people like Ted Cruz have spoken out against mandatory minimums. Both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have addressed this issue, after being pushed by Black Lives Matter. But notice on the Democratic side, Bill Clinton in 1992 made his case to the American people by attacking Rev. Jesse Jackson, executing an African-American with mental health issues in his own state and putting more cops on the street. Hillary Clinton is having to speak out about the catastrophic excesses that have resulted from that kind of attitude. Even Bill Clinton himself has had to come out and say that things have gone too far.
“People pretend that Democrats have been good on these issues and that Republicans have been terrible. In fact, it’s the reverse. Some of the worst policies have come from Democrats like Bill Clinton, and Gov. Gray Davis and Gov. Jerry Brown here in California. Meanwhile, Republican governors like Rick Perry, Nathan Deal in Georgia and John Kasich in Ohio have actually been closing prisons. It’s not a traditional debating point, but it’s an issue that’s rising in importance.”
There’s a lot of discussion already, but that doesn’t always translate into reform. Do you think that now’s finally the time?
“Now here’s something that I think nobody knows. President Obama went to a prison, the only sitting president who’d ever been to a prison. Some people thought that was historic, but that was only a third of the history that was made that day. When he came out of the prison, he didn’t come out chastising the people who were locked up. Instead, he came out and identified with them. He himself had done some of the same things that got these kids in trouble. Now that’s history. For a sitting president to identify with incarcerated felons? And to point out, ‘There but for the grace of good and good parenting, go I?’ That’s extraordinary. That a president would have been in prison, that an American president would have been a felon — that’s a remarkable statement.
“Another third of the history that day was that no serious Republican in the United States of America attacked him for it. In fact, John Boehner himself said he wanted to have a vote on bipartisan criminal justice reform. Now this is a president who could put forward a bill that declared kittens are cute and he would be attacked by Republicans. This is a president that cannot get Republicans to agree with him on anything. And yet on this issue a black president goes into a prison and talks to black felons, and he doesn’t get attacked at all. Now that gives you a sense of the level and depth of the sea change on this issue. You can see in that one day how far this issue has moved in a very short period of time.
“We will get comprehensive criminal justice reform signed by this president, if not by Christmas, certainly by Easter. It’s the only thing that a critical mass of leaders actually agree needs to be done. There might be a thousand fights on the details, but everyone agrees it has to happen.”
This interview has been condensed and edited.
(Front page image: John Moore/Getty Images)

Who’s Responsible for Mass Incarceration? Van Jones Weighs In

It could be said that Van Jones is a Renaissance man. Best known for his book Rebuild the Dream, a proposal to revive the American economy, Jones also served as President Barack Obamas special advisor on green jobs, co-founded four nonprofits to tackle the countrys largest obstacles and regularly appears as a commentator on CNN.

Recently, the Yale Law School graduate turned his attention to mass incarceration. He spoke to NationSwell by phone from the Bay Area about the latest in criminal justice reform.

After so many highly publicized events the shootings of Michael Brown, Eric Garner, you could go on and on people on both sides of the aisle are talking about criminal justice reform. What allowed this historic moment to happen?

“I think that the core values of both political parties have been violated by the massive expansion of the incarceration industry. If our country is a ‘liberty and justice for all’ country in the ideal, then both parties have their roles to play. The Republicans tend to be the part of liberty. Theyre concerned about individual rights and limited government. Well, the incarceration industry is rolling over both those ideas every day. The Democrats tend to be very concerned about justice — particularly social and racial justice. Well, obviously the incarceration industry is the antithesis of that. Its the antithesis of treating marginalized groups fairly. Both parties have their own independent reasons for being concerned. Then you have this explosion of digital media, social media and hashtag activism that has created a context in which both see the salience of the issue.”

For so long, our justice system seemed to rely on fear: We need harsh penalties so criminals aren’t out on the streets committing more crimes; we can’t change our policing methods because crime will go up. How do you combat that pervasive negative emotion?

“Both political parties were stuck on stupid for three decades. Democrats and Republicans were in a footrace with each other off this cliff to see who could propose dumber, longer sentences for increasingly petty offenses, and both parties got completely away from any kind of evidence-based, rational policymaking in this area.

“I think now were seeing another set of fears is beginning to counterbalance that. Crime has reached historic lows, both in places where there was excessive incarceration and in places where there was not. Crimes been going down and so people can be a little more reasonable when they think about this stuff psychologically. But theres also a growing fear on the right of increasing government power as more of a libertarian strain in the Republican party gets bigger. Their concern for militarized police, people being jailed for personal choices of drugs and even the NSA has created a counterbalancing set of fears within some quarters of the right.”

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So, do you capitalize on that fear? Or do eventually you need to shift perceptions for a more lasting change?

“It took decades to get a system this big and unjust in place. You now have a lot of economic interests that are baked into the cake here. And its not just private prisons. You have public employee unions that are made up of prison guards who have a stake in the status quo. You have whole towns that have now been built up around prisons out in rural parts of America. Theyre gonna fight to keep those prisons open because theyre looking at being a prison town or a ghost town. This is going to be a long process of unwinding mass incarceration. What really has to happen is a much deeper paradigm shift.”

Personally, how did you get involved in this issue of criminal justice reform?

“Ive been African American for a very long time. From that perspective, its very difficult to ignore the racial imbalances that have been built up and even accelerated in our criminal justice system. Iowas population is two percent black, but 25 percent of its prison population is black. I agree with the author Michelle Alexander when she says this is the new Jim Crow. We had enslavement in the 1700 and 1800s, we had Jim Crow segregation and now we have mass incarceration. Its another way to deny basic humanity and dignity and equality to people with darker-colored skin.

“I think a lot of people in the back of their minds believe theres more and more black people in prison because more and more black people are criminals. And yet the numbers dont bear it out. In fact, African-Americans and whites do illegal drugs at exactly the same rates, literally the exact same rate. So, if 10 percent of African-Americans are using substances at any given point, 10 percent of whites are. And yet African-Americans are not incarcerated at equal rates. Not at double the rate, nor at three times, but at six times the rates of whites doing the exact same thing. Now thats not These African-Americans should get better educated and pull their pants up. Thats literally six times the rate of incarceration.

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“Now where does that come from? It comes from police assuming the worst about any African-American motorist or pedestrian and giving them extra scrutiny. They’re more likely to be stopped, and in those encounters, more likely to be arrested, more likely to be held without bail, more likely to be given heavier charges by district attorneys. At every step and stage, you end up with unfair treatment. It’s not that there’s a lot of outright racism. It’s not conscious — ‘Oh, I hate all black people. I want them to be in prison.’ It’s just this tiny little tickle in the back of your brain that says, ‘I need to secure this guy,’ or ‘I need to teach this guy a lesson.’ As opposed to the white college student to whom he maybe says, ‘Oh well, boys will be boys,’ or maybe, ‘They’ll grow out of it.’ But black guys appear as marauding, drug-abusing menaces. Those kinds of things make it very important for me to speak up.”
This interview has been edited and condensed. 

Republicans and Democrats Rarely Agree On Anything. Except This

Republicans and Democrats indicated at the start of last week’s legislative term that 2015 is the year for criminal justice reform.
With an ideological split dividing President Obama and congressional leadership, you can probably expect more bickering than legislation to come from Washington over the next two years. But one of the few issues lawmakers seem to agree on is the need to reduce our prison population, now surpassing 2.3 million inmates. High-profile Republicans are lining up behind sentencing reform at the same time that Democratic leaders, including Rep. G.K. Butterfield, the new chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC), announced that the overhauling of the criminal justice system is the top priority.
“We believe Congress has a critical role to play in helping to restore trust in the criminal justice system, ensuring that every American is treated equally before the law,” write Reps. Elijah Cummings, John Conyers, Jr., and Bennie Thompson, the ranking Democratic members on three powerful House committees. “This is a transformative moment for our country.”
Statistics about our country’s prison system are disturbing, to say the least. There are now more black men in prison, jail or on parole than were enslaved in 1850, The New Yorker calculates. The entire populations of Philadelphia and Detroit could fit in the bunks of our jails, Pacific Standard adds. And the costs of all these cells are staggering: Detaining inmates now eats up almost one-third of the Justice Department’s annual budget.
This growing federal bureaucracy has caused many Republicans to pivot away from the party’s traditional tough-on-crime stance. Why? It just makes economic sense. Add the nationwide anger over the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner, and the rallying cry for change is louder than ever — from both sides of the aisle.
“There is a well-founded mistrust between the African-American community and law enforcement officers. The statistics are clear. Video clips are clear,” says Rep. Butterfield. “You will see the Congressional Black Caucus make criminal justice reform a centerpiece of our work.”
As solutions, black legislators have promised to push for updates to “outdated” mandatory sentencing laws, accountability for police and “unethical prosecutors” and access to competent public defenders, says Butterfield, a North Carolina Democrat.
This progressive rhetoric is expected from Butterfield’s caucus — known on the Hill as the “Conscience of Congress” — but what is unusual this year is that a group from the right, including Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky, John Cornyn of Texas, Mike Lee and Orrin Hatch of Utah and Rob Portman of Oregon, are also trumpeting reform. Each of these lawmakers has introduced bipartisan legislation aimed at undoing decades of slamming criminals behind bars.
“I say enough’s enough. I won’t sit idly by and watch our criminal justice system continue to consume, confine and define our young men,” Paul, a likely presidential candidate, told the National Urban League last summer. “I say we take a stand for justice now.”
Reform still won’t be easy. Last year, the Smarter Sentencing Act, a proposal to shorten prison sentences for low-level drug crimes, and the Federal Prison Reform Act, a bill that would have given inmates credit for time served in job training and drug rehab programs, both stalled and died without a vote on the floor.
Looking ahead, any future bills will have to win approval from Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Rep. Bob Goodlatte of Virginia, the Republicans chairmen of each chamber’s judiciary committee. Both boast reputations for being tough on crime, and both can delay any bill indefinitely with exhaustive reports, hearings and amendments. But in a hopeful sign last month, Grassley introduced a bipartisan bill with Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, a Rhode Island Democrat, designed to prevent “at risk-youth from entering the [prison] system” and helping juvenile offenders already “in the system become valuable members of communities.”
As is usually the case in Washington, compromise seems to be the way forward. “There will be times when I will encourage the CBC to reach across the aisle and try to reach some bipartisan deals that will not make us feel good, but will move the needle in our communities and communities of color,” Butterfield tells BET. “The fight for the future is not a black fight, a Democratic or Republican fight; it is a fight that all fair-minded Americans should promote.”
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Big Bets: Working With Schools to Reduce Dropout Rates of Low-Income College Students

Alexandra Bernadotte was the first in her family to attend college. The Haitian-born first-generation American remembers the day her acceptance letter to Dartmouth College arrived, and the celebration that followed.  “We treated the moment almost as though we won the lottery. We thought OK, we’ve made it, this was what the dream was about,” she says. Bernadotte’s parents had moved to the United States when she was very young, leaving her to grow up with her grandmother in Port-au-Prince. She eventually joined her parents and sister in inner-city Boston, and from that point on had been instructed that getting into college was the path to a better life in this country. But, she says, even though she was accepted to the college of her choice, the real challenge was yet to come. “We assumed the most difficult part of the journey was over… But I completely bombed my first year at Dartmouth. I failed academically, socially and emotionally.”
Bernadotte learned a lot from her first year at college. She sought help, bounced back and graduated. But most low-income students in college aren’t so lucky. According to a recent New York Times article, roughly 25 percent of college freshman from poorer backgrounds will end up getting their diploma. Bernadotte founded the national nonprofit Beyond 12 to try and increase that number by providing high schools and colleges with more information so they can better prepare low-income and immigrant students like herself for a successful postsecondary education.
MORE: Delaware Pushes to Get More Low-Income Students Enrolled in Higher Education