Lawmakers on both side of the aisle have expressed their support for criminal justice reform and reversing the harmful, unequal effects of the war on drugs. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) wants them to take action.
Waters introduced the Mandatory Minimum Reform Act on Thursday, legislation which would end all mandatory minimum sentences for people convicted of violating drug laws. Waters told ThinkProgress that she hopes the timing is finally right for the bill, a more progressive version of legislation she has introduced in the past, to finally gain bipartisan support.
“We’re seeing a change in attitude now and the old law and order discussion and ways of campaigning have diminished quite a bit, and so I do think we have a better chance now,” she said about the bill getting support from House Republicans. “People’s thinking has evolved and they have come to understand that mandatory minimums are unfair, they were targeted, and that it’s costly to have low-level offenders locked up.”
Former Attorney General Eric Holder said in 2013 that the U.S. Justice Department would no longer pursue mandatory minimum sentences for certain low-level, nonviolent drug offenders. Waters’ bill would extend that discretion to other drug crimes and would codify the change in practice into law.
“People who get involved with the criminal justice system must be seen as individuals and judges and courtrooms need the opportunity to see who these people are, what the intentions were, how much they’re really involved, their backgrounds, everything,” Waters said. “If you eliminate that ability for judges to see the individuals and they simply go along with a cookie cutter mandatory minimum, it’s what’s caused us so many problems with filling up our prisons and costing the taxpayers a lot of money.”
Waters, the ranking member on the House Committee on Financial Services, says she has spent her career advocating against harsh penalties and mandatory minimums, which disproportionality hurt African Americans and other minority communities.
She gained national attention after the 1992 verdict acquitting the police officers involved in beating Rodney King in the district that Waters represented at the time — South-Central Los Angeles. She has remained involved in criminal justice activism, supporting the Black Lives Matter movement and the recent renewed attention on police violence.
“Those three little words have captured the imagination of this country,” she said. “Now, the world is watching and with the cameras that everybody’s carrying, what Black Lives Matter signals is that not only has there been unfair and unjust treatment, but we’re going to fight against it. We’re going to look at how police policies work.”
Now that the movement has begun coming up with concrete policy suggestions, Waters said she thinks now could be the time for both police and sentencing reform.
“When you take a look at what’s happening on the street with police officers…people know that’s unfair and it’s unjust and it should not happen,” she said. “Just as they know that about what happens on the street, they know the court system has not been fair. What happens on the street and what happens in the justice system is all under scrutiny now.”