California Sen. Kamala Harris acknowledged the need for criminal justice reform at the congressional level as the Justice Department goes in what she said is a different direction.
“Are we smart on crime?” the Democratic darling said during a female incarceration event in Washington on Tuesday. “The answer is not to build more prisons. […] And the answer, [Attorney General] Jeff Sessions, is not to return to relying on mandatory minimum sentences.”
She added the war on drugs was an “abject failure” and “especially with this guy [Sessions] talking about reviving the war on drugs. It’s crazy.”
During a panel session, Harris said she is working on a bill to “encourage the reform of the money bail system” nationwide.
“We’re still working on it, and shopping for co-sponsors. Hopefully sooner rather than later,” Harris told reporters following her speech. “I think there’s some room for getting legislation passed that, for example, bail reform.”
“I feel optimistic that we can appeal to people across the aisle,” Harris said, citing Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, who has introduced bipartisan criminal justice reform legislation before.
According to the Prison Policy Initiative, “722,000 people in local jails have not been convicted and are in jail because they are either too poor to make bail and are being held before trial, or because they’ve just been arrested and will make bail in the next few hours or days.”
A 2015 New York Times report found in New York City, even when bail is set at $500 or less, 85 percent of defendants were unable to afford it.
