An administration not known for policy creativity is unlikely to have useful internal policy debates. But in the Trump administration, prison reform is a welcome exception.
This is largely because of the efforts of President Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner, who, in common with millions of poor and minority children in America, has had the searing experience of visiting a father in prison. Kushner has displayed considerable passion in recruiting conservatives to the cause of prison reform. He has been opposed by Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who seems stuck in a get-tough-on-crime time warp.
In the context of this disagreement — reflected in the broader conservative movement — the House has passed a worthwhile but watered-down bill called the First Step Act. This legislation would make changes on the exit side of incarceration — increasing funding for education and job-training programs and allowing inmates to earn credits for early release. As a result of opposition from Sessions and others, the bill does not focus on the entrance side of incarceration — sentencing reform that would encourage alternatives to imprisonment for less dangerous offenders.
In the Senate, the Republican chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa), is pushing for comprehensive reform that covers both exit and entrance. And Grassley is urging Trump to use his tweeting superpower to endorse a bolder approach.
Conservatives are split on issues surrounding prison reform. But the debate is happening for a supremely conservative reason: because states have demonstrated it can work. In the current issue of National Affairs, Lars Trautman and Arthur Rizer III provide a helpful survey of a red-state policy revolution. States such as Texas, Georgia and Louisiana have taken measures to divert addicts and people with mental-health problems from incarceration, to limit mandatory minimums and to make wider and better use of parole.
The theory is simple. America’s vast experiment in routine incarceration — which has quadrupled the U.S. incarceration rate since 1972 — had some effect in reducing contact between dangerous offenders and potential victims. But recidivism rates are dismal. And millions of relatively nondangerous people have been swept up into a justice system that puts them in intimate contact with dangerous offenders, exposes them to rape and violence, deprives their families of emotional and financial support, and sends them back into communities without skills and stamped with a felony stigma.
Don’t get your hopes up before you read the bill:
https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/5682/text
Once again, “sex offenders” are called out for exclusion:
(D) INELIGIBLE PRISONERS.—A prisoner is ineligible to receive time credits under this paragraph if the prisoner is serving a sentence for a conviction under any of the following provisions of law:
“(xxiii) Any section of chapter 109A, relating to sexual abuse, except that with regard to section 2244, only a conviction under subsection (c) of that section (relating to abusive sexual contact involving young children) shall make a prisoner ineligible under this subparagraph.
“(xxiv) Section 2251, relating to the sexual exploitation of children.
“(xxv) Section 2251A, relating to the selling or buying of children.
“(xxvi) Any of paragraphs (1) through (3) of section 2252(a), relating to certain activities relating to material involving the sexual exploitation of minors.
“(xxvii) A second or subsequent conviction under any of paragraphs (1) through (6) of section 2252A(a), relating to certain activities relating to material constituting or containing child pornography.
“(xxviii) Section 2260, relating to the production of sexually explicit depictions of a minor for importation into the United States.
Additionally:
(D) ELIGIBLE TERMINALLY ILL OFFENDER.—The term ‘eligible terminally ill offender’ means an offender in the custody of the Bureau of Prisons who—
“(i) is serving a term of imprisonment based on conviction for an offense or offenses that do not include any crime of violence (as defined in section 16(a) of title 18, United States Code), sex offense (as defined in section 111(5) of the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (34 U.S.C. 20911(5))), offense described in section 2332b(g)(5)(B) of title 18, United States Code, or offense under chapter 37 of title 18, United States Code;
So there you go. Another pineapple up our a**.
Well I am not totally hopeful but at least I am happy to see that my vote for Trump might actually have some effect on change for the better as far as sex offender and justice reform in general is concerned.
If nothing else it’s better than the status quo we had going on which certainly has done nothing except get worse!
Arizona needs help in it’s high interaction, food not for human consumption. And excessive sentencing! The percentage should go down as well from 85% to 65% this state is unforgiving and does not concentrate on mental illness or drug addiction. They just throw away the keys