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Op-Ed

Dick Morris: Bill Designed To Solve Crime Problem Is Really No Solution at All

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Legislation nearing passage in the Senate will reverse decades of progress in reducing crime.

Originally designed by Republicans to improve conditions in prisons, the bill has been hijacked by Democrats to slash sentences and release dangerous criminals.

But, because of its earlier incarnation, President Donald Trump, perhaps impelled by advice from his son-in-law Jared Kushner (whose father was in prison), is backing the bill.

He’s mistaken. It’s a bad piece of legislation.

The bill, called the First Step Act, would:

1. Immediately make retroactive Obama’s Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 that reduced crack penalties to the lower levels imposed for cocaine possession. The theory was that blacks used crack and whites used cocaine. But the bill equalized the sentences by lowering the crack penalties. It should have raised the cocaine sentences instead. This change will trigger the almost immediate release of 2,600 federal prison inmates.

2. Give judges the authority to bypass federal sentencing guidelines and impose lower sentences, precisely the kind of judicial discretion that led to the slap-on-the-wrist sentences that caused the crime wave of the 60s and 70s.

3. Dilute the “three strikes and you’re out” sentencing provisions imposing 25-year terms for a third felony conviction.

4. Increase time off sentences for all criminals — violent and otherwise — by one week per year served, allowing the release of 4,000 inmates the day the law takes effect.

Do you think the Senate should pass this bill?

The bill is really the “first step” in pursuing the Democrats’ agenda of decriminalizing crime by sharply reducing the number of people in prison.

Citing statistics on the racial composition of the inmate population and the higher incarceration rates in the U.S. relative to European countries, progressives argue that we have “mass incarceration” in America.

It is not racism that leads to the disproportionate incarceration of blacks but the fact that African-Americans commit more crime.

According to 2013 federal crime data, blacks accounted for 51 percent of murder arrests and 57 percent of murder victims.

Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., is leading the fight against the bill. Despite its highly liberal provisions, a majority of Republican senators are indicating that they are likely to approve it.

Related:
Joe Biden Has Declared War Against the Very Thing That May Save His Son

We need to stop the momentum behind this dangerous bill.

Please sign the attached petition opposing it. When you enter your zip code, we will send your email to your senators and congressman.

The views expressed in this opinion article are those of their author and are not necessarily either shared or endorsed by the owners of this website. If you are interested in contributing an Op-Ed to The Western Journal, you can learn about our submission guidelines and process here.

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Dick Morris is a former adviser to President Bill Clinton as well as a political author, pollster and consultant. His most recent book, "50 Shades of Politics," was written with his wife, Eileen McGann.




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