Very short diary here, but Kamala Harris (D-CA) and Rand Paul (R-KY) have jointly introduced a bill to provide states with grants for reforming or outright replacing their system of pretrial bail. The bill (pdf) is called the Pretrial Integrity and Safety Act of 2017, and though it doesn’t make any changes to existing law as such, it provides encouragement and financial incentive (grants of up to three years) for states and reservations to study and enact best practices with regards to bail. Here’s the relevant item:
(1) ACTIVITIES.—Amounts received … shall be used for developing the long-term, sustainable capacity to perform more effective pretrial practices that include system analysis, training and technical assistance, meeting facilitation, research and performance evaluation, information technology reprogramming, and shall seek to incorporate and implement the elements described in paragraph (2).
Paragraph 2 includes replacing bail systems “with individual pretrail assessments” that are the least restrictive possible and guarantee the defendant both effective counsel and the right to a speedy trial. The bill spends four pages laying out the facts and figures, arguing that contemporary research provides us with ideas for a better and more equitable pretrial system. The bill also requires data collection of the new procedures in order to continue following best practices.
Sens. Harris and Paul have also written a joint editorial in the New York Times explaining their bill:
Excessive bail disproportionately harms people from low-income communities and communities of color. The Supreme Court ruled in Bearden v. Georgia in 1983 that the Constitution prohibits “punishing a person for his poverty,” but that’s exactly what this system does. Nine out of 10 defendants who are detained cannot afford to post bail, which can exceed $20,000 even for minor crimes like stealing $105 in clothing.
Anyway, it’s a small bill and it’s just attempting to get certain state experiments (they cite Kentucky and New Jersey, among others) adopted more broadly, but it shows that criminal justice reform is an issue that actually can unite members of both parties in practical ways (witness the horror to Sessions’ recent comments about asset forfeiture, which spanned the ideological spectrum, something we should be exploiting more!) We won’t be holding hands across the aisle anytime soon, but we all recognize there’s a problem and there are ways we can work together to fix it.
Now that this is out there, would be a good time to call our Senators/Reps to support it...