We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.
FIRST STEP – THEY WERE FOR IT BEFORE THEY WERE AGAINST IT
Remember the abuse heaped on 2004 Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry – currently Joe Biden’s carbon-spewing climate change czar – when he told a Marshall University crowd back during the ’04 campaign that “I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it?” It was considered the poster child for political flip-flops.
So far, three Republican candidates for president have nothing of John in denouncing Donald Trump’s signature criminal justice reform bill, 2018’s First Step Act. They were all for it before they were against it.
Florida Gov Ron DeSantis has called it a “jailbreak bill.” Former Vice President Mike Pence said, “We need to take a step back” from it. Former Arkansas Gov Asa Hutchinson proclaimed, “There’s probably some areas there that can be adjusted.”
Even Trump barely talks about First Step while his rivals for the 2024 GOP nomination attack it as a chief contributor to the rise in violent crime. “It has allowed dangerous people who have reoffended and really, really hurt a number of people,” DeSantis said on The Ben Shapiro Show. “So one of the things I want to do when I’m president is go to Congress and seek the repeal of the First Step Act.”
Politico said last weekend that “GOP candidates targeting the criminal justice law is, to a degree, an illustration of how the party views crime as a major election issue and a useful cudgel to bludgeon Trump with.”
DeSantis was a congressman who voted in favor of the House version of First Step, which was a dream come true for federal prisoners compared to the final product. Pence, meanwhile, worked alongside Trump’s son-in-law and advisor Jared Kushner to help push First Step with skeptical Republican lawmakers on the Hill. Asa Hutchinson, a former DEA chief who has praised the First Step Act’s reduction in federal sentencing disparities between crack and powder cocaine, says that president, he would be open to making changes.
Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung tweeted last month, “Lyin’ Ron. He voted for the First Step Act. Would be a shame if there was video of him praising it in an interview with a local FL television station.”
Overturning the First Step Act is easier said than done. Republican pollster Adam Geller says he understands why DeSantis and others are arguing against First Step in order to separate themselves from Trump without offending his base. But Geller said he doesn’t see it as an effective message to win over voters or members of Congress, both groups who any future president would have to work with. “On the assumption that you become president, who exactly you’re going to solicit to overturn this legislation? Republicans voted for it. So did Democrats,” Gellar told Politico. “When you say you’re going to overturn that, with who[m]?
While First Step may not face serious trouble, the rising anti-crime mood suggests that the window has slammed shut on hopes for crack-powder disparity, retroactivity for some First Step changes, and maybe even marijuana reform until after the presidential election, now 17 months away.
Politico, DeSantis takes aim at Trump’s signature criminal justice reform law (June 18, 2023)
Florida Phoenix, DeSantis goes after Trump on federal criminal justice reforms, clashing over law-and-order front (June 16, 2023)
– Thomas L. Root