10 Races that Could Totally Change Courts, Cops and Drug Law in 2020

[RandySF]

1. GEORGIA :‘ Abolish the Police’ will be put to voters

In response to both the controversial killing and corruption more broadly, Republican state Senator Bill Ligon introduced a bill that will put a nonbinding question to residents of Glynn County in November: “Shall the Glynn County Board of Commissioners retain the Glynn County Police Department and make necessary reforms to answer the concerns of the Glynn County grand jury or shall the Glynn County Board of Commissioners abolish the Glynn County Police Department and allow the Glynn County Sheriff's Department to be the sole local law enforcement in the county?” That bill—as well as a companion bill asking voters if they want the question’s results to be binding—just passed in the state Legislature and now needs only the governor’s signature to be put on the ballot.


2. ARIZONA: An ex-con former sheriff—and Trump ally—wants his job back

In 2016, the county—which includes the heavily Latino and liberal Phoenix, and whose more moderate suburban population is growing more Democratic—finally voted him out, replacing him with Paul Penzone, a Democrat who promised less drama and more accountability. The next year, Arpaio was convicted of criminal contempt for refusing for years to abide by a court order to stop racially profiling Latinos. But having been one of the first public officials to endorse Donald Trump in early 2016 (and a fellow “birther” conspiracy theorist), he was quickly pardoned by the president. Trump called Arpaio “a patriot” who was “protecting the public from the scourges of crime and illegal immigration.”

Now, the 88-year-old has thrown his hat in the ring for sheriff again, hoping that Phoenix voters are worried enough about immigration and crime that they want him back. It might not be such a long shot, either: His comeback campaign has already out-fundraised his opponents, though it has relied heavily on out-of-state donors. And Arpaio did have high approval ratings for much of his early career as sheriff. But Arizona is changing, with the presidential election and a U.S. Senate race in a once reliably red state appearing increasingly competitive for Democrats. Arpaio faces off against his former second-in-command, Jerry Sheridan, in the Republican primary in August, and if he wins that, he’ll compete in November against Penzone—a race that will measure just how willing voters are to turn their backs on the crime rhetoric of the past few decades.


3. KANSAS: Democrats try to break a decade-old supermajority

For eight straight years after 2010, the Kansas GOP had a trifecta of power over the state capitol—a Republican governor as well as Republican supermajorities in the Senate and House. Over that time, the prison population kept rising, and even Republicans have grown concerned with overcrowding.

Then, in 2018, minority whip of the state Senate Laura Kelly defeated Kansas’ immigration hawk secretary of state Kris Kobach to become the first Democratic governor in nearly a decade. Now, in 2020, Kansas Democrats hope they can finally break the Republican Party’s supermajority grip over both chambers of the Legislature. They only need to pick up one seat in the House and three in the Senate. And if they do, criminal justice is likely to be one of the big changes afoot: Polls show a majority of Kansas voters of both parties want changes to the criminal justice system and would especially like to see the state reduce its imprisonment rates. And the Floyd protests that have spread to even rural Kansas have brought only more attention and urgency to the issue of policing reform.

Without the power to override a veto, Republican lawmakers would have to come to the table with Democrats. The state’s GOP has not been outright opposed to criminal justice reform—former Gov. Sam Brownback supported programs to reduce recidivism, and the current Legislature approved a bill to create a bipartisan commission that will review sentencing guidelines as well as all other matters it determines “are appropriate and necessary to complete a thorough review of the criminal justice system.” But these efforts have not done enough, say Democrats—and bills to do more have failed. A bill on diversion and treatment programs recommended by the bipartisan commission in December died in committee this May. As did another bill—introduced by a Democratic state representative and sparked by the police shooting of a 17-year-old in 2018—that would have required outside investigations of officer-involved deaths and greater transparency around investigations that don’t end in officer prosecutions. A few Democratic down-ballot wins this November might finally give the party the leverage to push through some previously elusive reforms.

4. NEBRASKA, UTAH AND MAYBE MINNESOTA: Some states may amend their constitutions—to ban ‘slavery’

Amending constitutions to abolish slavery altogether is not without its critics. Many prison activists say banning unpaid labor is not enough of a reform, since most prison workers are exploited with meager wages, which the anti-slavery amendments do nothing to fix. And in Colorado, where voters amended their constitution to ban slavery in 2018, some were worried the change would also effectively ban community service as a sentence, pushing more people behind bars. But in states where all forms of slavery are banned, including Colorado now, community service is still allowed, as those programs are considered voluntary alternatives to incarceration.


5. CALIFORNIA: The Golden State rethinks bail reform

Cash bail has quickly become one of the biggest targets of justice reformers, who argue that the American pretrial detention system is unfair and deeply damaging: It fills jails with poor people who haven’t been convicted, often keeping them out of work and away from their families for months, simply because they can’t afford to front enough money to walk free before their court date, while letting potentially dangerous but wealthy suspects buy their release.

But the road to change has been halting, at best. A New York bail reform law got caught up in finger-pointing politics over its impact on crime rates and is now being rethought. In California, then-Gov. Jerry Brown signed Senate Bill 10 in August 2018, to make America’s largest state the first to completely abolish the use of cash bail—but in a sign of how quickly the criminal justice debate can move, the law immediately came under fire from both sides and has never actually been implemented.

By the time it was signed, many onetime supporters had already turned on the reform, arguing that its replacement for bail—a system in which judges and risk assessment tools determine whether an arrestee is too dangerous to be let go before trial—might actually be quite susceptible to racial bias. Meanwhile, bail bond companies, which had been fighting the proposal from the start, launched a petition to put SB10 up for a direct ballot referendum. Before the law went into effect last year, that petition met the signature threshold to qualify for this year’s ballot, and the law was put on hold until voters could weigh in. Now, Californians will have to decide for themselves whether they want cash bail kept or abolished in their state.


6. MISSISSIPPI, NEW JERSEY, SOUTH DAKOTA—AND MAYBE OTHERS: Several states look to legalize cannabis—though Covid-19 is getting in the way

Now, however, several of those state campaigns have been put on hold because it’s become harder, if not impossible, to safely gather signatures during a pandemic. A few measures are still awaiting signature verification, and only three are certain to be taken up this November: Mississippi’s measure to legalize marijuana for medical use, New Jersey’s question of whether to legalize recreational use, and South Dakota’s separate measures asking voters to decide on both medical and recreational use.


7. OREGON AND MAYBE D.C: A new campaign to decriminalize mushrooms—and possibly more

Last year, Denver and Oakland became the first jurisdictions in the United States to decriminalize natural psychedelics, including what are commonly known as “magic mushrooms,” as well as other plant-based hallucinogens like peyote and ayahuasca. Similar efforts toward decriminalization of these substances, which advocates point out are non-addictive and research suggests may even have therapeutic benefits, are underway in dozens of cities. The first statewide statute could be adopted in Oregon this November.

Last month, the proponents of IP34, a ballot initiative that would allow the “manufacture, delivery, administration of psilocybin [the chemical compound in “magic mushrooms”] at supervised, licensed facilities,” turned in more than the necessary petition signatures to get on the ballot, but those signatures are pending verification this summer by the Oregon secretary of state’s office.


8. KENTUCKY: Voters get a second bite at a victims’ rights amendment

One particular victims’ rights law, Marsy’s Law, has been so popular that voters in more than a dozen states have amended their constitutions to adopt it over the past decade, thanks in large part to the relentless campaigning and bankrolling of its namesake’s brother, an eccentric billionaire former tech CEO. Marsy’s Law has critics from the civil rights sphere, who say the provisions in the amendment, while well intentioned, threaten to increase prison populations and undermine due process. Among other things, the amendment requires victims’ families to be notified and allows their concerns to be considered during bail, sentencing and parole hearings. But it has also faced legal challenges in Pennsylvania and was overturned in Montana and Kentucky on technicalities over how state constitutions can be amended.

In November, Kentucky voters will get a second bite of the apple; Marsy’s Law is on the ballot again, after the amendment was approved by 63 percent of voters in 2018 but blocked by state courts for the ballot language being insufficiently descriptive of its substance. This year, the full text of the proposal will be on the ballot.


9. Oklahoma: Sooners might get to vote on a mass incarceration measure

This specific proposal to restrict sentence enhancements has been taken up in the Legislature before. “The policy was introduced in 2017, 2018 and 2019,” Kris Steele, executive director of Oklahomans for Criminal Justice Reform and a former state speaker of the House, told Tulsa World. “Ultimately, the policy failed to gain traction.” So now proponents are hoping to take it directly to voters with a ballot initiative.


10. CALIFORNIA: A progressive prosecutor takes on the Black incumbent in charge of law and order in L.A.

Gascón opposes the death penalty, and much of Lacey’s agenda. He started his career in the Los Angeles Police Department in 1978, rising from patrol officer to assistant chief, then moving to become police chief of Mesa, Arizona, in 2006. Three years later, he moved back to California, succeeding Kamala Harris as San Francisco’s district attorney, where he became a full-throated advocate of a more progressive approach to justice. He advocated for the end of cash bail and supported independent investigations of police officers for shootings or excessive use of force. He resigned in 2018 to take care of his elderly mother, who died last September.

The race is also a referendum on just how quickly the summer protests are challenging the status quo. Lacey entered as a strong favorite, backed by heavy police-union spending, and nearly reached the 50 percent threshold in the March primary to avoid a runoff in November entirely. But the ground has been shifting since then: Gascón was recently endorsed by the Los Angeles Times, and Lacey’s near-unanimous support among establishment Democrats has begun peeling away.



https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/06/25/criminal-justice-prison-conditions-on-the-2020-ballot-315460

[RandySF]

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