Is Scott Walker the only one who isn’t for criminal justice reform?

[William Tell]

Is Scott Walker the only one who isn’t for criminal justice reform?

Is Scott Walker the only one who isn’t for criminal justice reform?

In his piece “Republican 2016ers Are Rethinking ‘Tough on Crime,” National Review’s Michael Tanner marvels at how much the GOP has evolved on the issue of criminal justice reform as reflected by the positions of the Republicans most likely to run for president.


“Most of the Republican presidential candidates are touting their positions in favor of reducing prison time, allowing some felons to expunge or seal their criminal records, and even reforming federal drug laws,” writes Tanner. “Rather than putting more people in jail and throwing away the key,” he adds “Republicans are for letting people out of jail.”


Tanner notes that, to varying degrees, Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, Rick Perry, Chris Christie and even Jeb Bush are for some form of criminal justice reform.
Who stands out as the exception to this trend? Writes Tanner:

One big exception to this trend is Scott Walker. Walker ran for governor of Wisconsin as an old-fashioned “law and order” Republican, pledging “to protect our families, our senior citizens and our property.” Bills that Walker sponsored while a legislator would have increased mandatory minimum sentences for everything from perjury to privacy invasion to intoxicated boating. He was perhaps the leading backer of Wisconsin’s “Truth in Sentencing” legislation, which ended parole opportunities for many categories of prisoners and increased prison time for others. As governor, Walker has resisted efforts to liberalize the state’s parole system, and the proportion of inmates granted parole has fallen in half during his tenure.

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Tanner also notes that:

Senator Marco Rubio also appears to be sticking to a hard line on criminal-justice issues. “While individuals from a variety of perspectives have made a compelling case that American law has been over-criminalized and over-federalized,” Rubio wrote in an op-ed, “reform should not begin with careless weakening of drug laws that have done so much to help end the violence and mayhem that plagued American cities in prior decades.”

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Read more at http://rare.us/story/is-scott-walke...-criminal-justice-reform/#Bci9W0JQoKWcUfhe.99

 

[andym]

So a continuation of the "drug war" and little reparation for the victims by the incarcerated?