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How Trump Gained the Upper Hand on Criminal Justice Issues in 2020 Campaign

Masood Farivar

   As he prepared to announce his candidacy for president on Sunday,
   former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg took a page from an old
   political playbook.

   Appearing in a black church in the city's Brooklyn borough last week,
   the multibillionaire media mogul apologized for long pushing a
   now-defunct policing tactic that had disproportionately targeted
   African American and Hispanic residents.

   Known as "stop and frisk," the controversial policy, imposed between
   2003 and 2013, allowed New York City police to stop, temporarily
   detain, and search anyone suspected of carrying weapons and other
   contraband.

   "I was wrong," Bloomberg declared to the congregation. To those who had
   been wronged by the policy, he said, "I apologize."

   Criminal justice policy records

   Bloomberg is the latest Democratic candidate forced to reckon with a
   criminal justice policy record that critics view as too punitive to
   minorities.

   Former Vice President Joe Biden has been criticized for backing a 1994
   crime bill that helped trigger a federal prison population explosion,
   while South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg has faced questions
   over policing tactics in his hometown.

   Others, including Senators Cory Booker and Kamala Harris, have had to
   justify their law enforcement policies as a former mayor of Newark, New
   Jersey, and a California prosecutor, respectively.

   That Democrats are under scrutiny over criminal justice issues is
   unusual. Historically, Democratic presidential candidates ran on
   platforms of civil rights and criminal justice reform while Republicans
   campaigned as tough law-and-order candidates, according to criminal
   justice experts.

   But as the 2020 campaign enters the crucial primary phase, Democratic
   candidates are being forced to disavow criminal justice policies they
   once championed, while Republican President Donald Trump -- who hardly
   discussed criminal justice in 2016 -- is touting himself as a leading
   reform candidate.

   Trump says he can make that claim because he signed into law a sweeping
   piece of legislation known as the [1]First Step Act last December. The
   legislation, which has released or reduced the prison sentences of
   thousands of inmates convicted of drug offenses, has earned Trump
   praise from many African Americans.

   "It's sort of a switch in what people thought was the standard
   left-right divide," said Noah Weinrich of Heritage Action for America,
   a conservative grassroots organization.

   So what happened?

   The short answer is the country has changed. The 1994 Crime Bill now
   under attack from liberals and African Americans was enacted during the
   Clinton administration, near the height of a violent crime epidemic in
   the country when heavy-handed policies enjoyed broad public support.

   But as crime has steadily declined over the past two decades to
   historically low levels, support for those measures has eroded and
   politicians on both sides of the aisle have increasingly embraced
   overhaul proposals.

References

   1. https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R45558.pdf

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