Jeff Sessions’ new policy is a ‘dumb’ and ‘ill-informed’ continuation of the war on drugs, critics say – MarketWatch

U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions tough-on-crime approach has irked critics, who fear it may undo years of progress on sentencing, particularly for non-violent drug offenses.

Sessions last week issued a memo to federal prosecutors telling them to pursue the most serious, provable offenses in charging and sentencing. The memo essentially directs federal prosecutors to throw the book at criminal offenders when they can, which is a contrast to the previous administrations stance on criminal justice.

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Under former Attorney General Eric Holder, federal prosecutors were advised against taking the most severe course of action for certain low-level, non-violent drug cases. The action was intended to avoid triggering unnecessary mandatory minimum sentences that disproportionately affect minorities. Now, marijuana legalization advocates, among other groups, are up in arms.

Sessions is taking the country back to the 1980s by escalating the failed policies of the drug war, said Michael Collins, deputy director of national affairs for the Drug Policy Alliance, in a statement.

About one in five, or 21% of the U.S. population, live in a state where using marijuana is legal, but the substance is still federally banned and labeled a Schedule I drug along with heroin and LSD.

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With 60% of Americans in support of legalizing marijuana and roughly 70%, according to a Quinnipiac poll, opposed to the federal government interfering in states where marijuana is legal, some in the industry predict that Sessions action will create major political backlash.

On Tuesday, the Drug Policy Alliance held a rally against Sessions war-on-drug-like policies outside of the Justice Department, that included members of advocacy group The Sentencing Project, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Open Society Policy Center, to name a few.

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Rand Paul, Republican U.S. Senator from Kentucky, on Monday penned an opinion piece for CNN, condemning Sessions policy change.

We should be treating our nations drug epidemic for what it is a public health crisis, not an excuse to send people to prison and turn a mistake into a tragedy, Senator Paul wrote. Mandatory sentencing automatically imposes a minimum number of years in prison for specific crimes usually drug related.

This isnt about legalizing drugs. It is about making the punishment more fitting and not ruining more lives.

Under Sessions directive, the change in how federal government will charge and sentence criminal offenders will be felt most by drug offenders, but it may also provide a clue as to how Sessions Justice Department plans to crack down on crime.

Holder, last week, called Sessions decision unwise and ill-informed.

Read also: Jeff Sessions is not wrong about addiction, but evidence says heroin is still more dangerous than marijuana

The policy announced today is not tough on crime. It is dumb on crime, he wrote in a statement. It is an ideologically motivated, cookie-cutter approach that has only been proven to generate unfairly long sentences that are often applied indiscriminately and do little to achieve long-term public safety.

Holders approach, while avoiding tough sentencing for certain drug offenses, did not change the policy for charging and sentencing for other federal crimes, and the most serious crimes were still treated with severe sentencing. But what Sessions is essentially saying is: We want to be tough on everything.

Sessions says the push to increase prosecutions is part of a plan to increase public safety. And there is an argument that this gives prosecutors more authority and more freedom to threaten criminal offenders with the most severe charge when bargaining plea deals.

The problem is federal criminal prosecutions have declined for the past five years, hitting the lowest level in nearly two decades, while at the same time the number of violent crimes in the U.S. has been on a downward trend for more than two decades, according to data from Pew Research.

And while conditions in federal prisons have improved in the past few years, they are still overcrowded.

The majority of people locked in federal prison arent even violent offenders, according to Marc Mauer, executive director of The Sentencing Project. And half of the people in federal prison are incarcerated on drug convictions.

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This move will not only exacerbate overcrowding in prison populations, it will be costly and divert needed resources from prevention and treatment, Mauer said.

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Jeff Sessions' new policy is a 'dumb' and 'ill-informed' continuation of the war on drugs, critics say - MarketWatch