A coalition of criminal justice reform advocates is asking President Obama to grant more commutations before leaving office, and add to the record number of reduced sentences that Obama has already announced.
“While your administration continues to review individual petitions, we urge you to also determine that nonviolent offenders in certain extremely low-risk categories either deserve expedited review or should be granted clemency absent an individualized review,” the coalition said in a public letter.
The letter was signed by more than 50 advocates including Van Jones and John Legend, and groups such as the Sentencing Project and the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund.
Obama has commuted the sentences of more than 1,000 federal inmates throughout his two terms, more than the last 11 presidents combined. He has upped his use of clemency during his second term, mostly focusing on prisoners whose sentences came during the government’s war on drugs in the 1970s and 80s.
“With time running short on your time in office, these steps would be a way for you to deliver lasting change for thousands of deserving individuals and their families,” the letter said.
Specifically, the group wants Obama to consider commuting the sentences of prisoners who did not benefit from the retroactivity granted under the Fair Sentencing Act in 2010. It also suggested “prison placement (to a camp — the lowest level of federal incarceration — or to a low or medium facility) as a surrogate for how an individual has behaved in prison” to speed up the process of reviewing whether people have served excessive time for drug charges other than crack.
“With a stroke of your pen, you could change the lives of thousands of individuals and their families and write a legacy that will stand throughout history,” the letter said. “The Constitution envisions precisely this kind of corrective against undue severity in the law.”
The coalition seems to hint that this is a last-minute way to act before President-elect Donald Trump takes office. The Republican campaigned on being a “law and order” candidate, a sign he may not be open to the sentencing reforms Obama has backed.
“We do not know whether the next president will support clemency efforts or criminal justice reform,” the letter said. “But we do know that until Jan. 20, you alone have the power to deliver both mercy and justice to those who deserve it.”
