You may have heard that Donald Trump pardoned, commuted, or dismissed charges for over 1,500 January 6th cases.
I’m not going to hash out the politics or how I feel on this, because now is really not the time for that.
While I am not happy that there are still hundreds of thousands of families caught up in the horrific criminal justice system, I choose hope.
My hope is tonight, there are 1,500 newly free people who will go back to their communities and demand prison reform. Their family members will know what has happened to them; they’ll know the wallet-draining costs of phone and video visits, the overpriced, unhealthy commissary. The horrible slop unfit for human consumption served to American citizens under the false label of food.
These people will tell others how awful incarceration is, and how badly reform is needed. They’ll inform people how the “freest” nation in the world is not at all free; how freedom is fragile.
My hope is they’ll write their legislative leaders and testify to the horrors that unfold in prisons everyday. That prison doesn’t work. They’ll roll up their sleeves and start getting to work on changing it.
And maybe this isn’t just a wish; Ashli Babbitt’s mother is already bringing attention to the very broken plea bargain system.
What I hope is that a new breed of advocate has been born; one who will lock arms with others and usher in meaningful change and reform, who will work toward constitutional protections, and that together, all of us can end mass incarceration in the “freest” country in the world.
