Democratic lawmakers proposed changes to presidential clemencies that would help release more people from federal prison.
Rep. Ayanna Pressley, Massachusetts Democrat, said Friday that the Justice Department is notoriously slow in reviewing requests and recommending clemency candidates and the process needs to be sped up.
Justice currently has a backlog of 15,000 clemency petitions from prisoners who are disproportionately minorities locked up for nonviolent crimes during the nation’s war on drugs.
“That’s 15,000 people, with loved ones waiting for their chance at justice. Justice delayed is justice denied,” said Ms. Pressley, who is among the lawmakers pushing the clemency overhaul.
Their bill would shift the clemency review and recommendation decisions to a panel of criminal justice experts, including at least one person who was previously incarcerated. The president would still make the final decision.
The legislation will have an uphill climb in Congress, where the Democrats’ narrow majority in both chambers has been unable to move the party’s ambitions agenda of criminal justice overhauls. The bill’s goal of getting more inmates released also faces headwinds from voters unnerved by a nationwide crime wave.
The legislation is another effort by the left to deal with what they see as a racist criminal justice system.
“The era of mass incarceration must end,” said House Democratic Caucus Chairman Hakeem Jeffries, a New York Democrat backing the clemency bill. He said the disproportionate number of Black people in prison is “a stain on our democracy” and the bill would “try to perfect a system of justice that’s imperfect right now.”
The lawmakers’ attempt to strip power from the Justice Department could also run into opposition from President Biden, said Rachel Barkow, a New York University law professor and the author of “Prisoners of Politics: Breaking the Cycle of Mass Incarceration.”
The administration has been considering changes to deal with the backlog of petitions that would retain the administration’s authority over the process. The administration is considering a process that reviews leniency for entire classes of prisoners.
The Justice Department did not immediately return a request for comment.
Despite the changes being contemplated, Ms. Barkow said she supported having an outside body should evaluate the clemency requests.
“The Justice Department is the same agency that brought the [criminal] cases in the first place. They don’t have an independent view. It’s definitely better to have a fresh set of eyes. They might have changed a lot in prison,” she said.
Ms. Pressley said she believes Mr. Biden is committed to addressing racial inequities in the justice system and her bill would give him a way to do that.
Mr. Jeffries said that reforming the criminal justice system has become a bipartisan issue.
Indeed, then-President Donald Trump in 2018 pardoned Alice Marie Johnson, a 63-year-old Black woman serving a life sentence for cocaine distribution and money laundering.
• Kery Murakami can be reached at kmurakami@washingtontimes.com.
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