Mapping the politics and making the case against the Sentencing Reform and Corrections Act of 2017

Over at the Powerline blog, Paul Mirengoff has this lengthy post about the Sentencing Reform and Corrections Act of 2017 titled "Leniency Legislation Is Back."  The post title previews Paul's disaffinity for the SRCA, and his post explains why after some forecasting about the politics surrounding the bill.  I recommend his post in full, and here are excerpts:

The [SRCA] bill that died two years ago is before the Judiciary Committee.  It will breeze through that body. Three of the legislation’s main opponents two years ago — Jeff Sessions, David Perdue and David Vitter — are no longer on the committee (Sessions and Vitter are no longer in the Senate).  Sens. Orrin Hatch and Ted Cruz remain and are likely to oppose the bill again, and Sen. Ben Sasse, a new member of the committee, might join them. But the committee will approve the leniency legislation, most likely with only three dissenters.

What happens then? I hope McConnell will make the same calculation he made two years ago under similar circumstances. However, Team Leniency, which includes the Majority Whip (Sen. Cornyn) and the Judiciary Committee chairman (Sen. Grassley), will push hard for a vote.

Meanwhile, many potential opponents of the legislation are focused on other matters, most notably immigration reform. The opposition troops have not yet been rallied.

On the plus side, though, Sen. Tom Cotton, who along with Jeff Sessions led the charge against leniency legislation two years ago, has his eye on this ball, notwithstanding his key role in the immigration battle.

The biggest difference between now and two years ago is, of course, that Donald Trump is president, not Barack Obama. The second biggest difference, for purposes of the sentencing reform debate, flows from the first — Jeff Sessions is the Attorney General.

Sessions still vigorously opposes reducing the mandatory minimums. His view is shared, I think, by President Trump. I’ve heard that the White House might make its opposition known publicly this week.

If Trump is against the leniency bill, it would be especially pointless for McConnell to bring it to a vote. Why split the GOP members and force them to vote on highly controversial legislation when the president doesn’t want the bill and likely would veto it?

My main purpose in writing this post is to call attention to the push for leniency legislation — to rally the troops. As for the merits of the bill, there are three main reasons why I oppose it.

First, the current mandatory minimums have been instrumental in the dramatic decrease in violent crime the U.S. has enjoyed since they were instituted. Why change a system that has been so effective in reducing violent crime?

Second, the leniency legislation would apply retroactively, Thus, thousands of prisoners could petition to be released even though they haven’t completed their legally imposed sentences.  Given the high recidivism rate for federal drug offenders — around 70 percent — the legislation is guaranteed to yield more crime, and not just by those released early but also by those sentenced to less time under the bill.

Third, the leniency legislation grants judges too much discretion in sentencing.  We know from the high-crime era before mandatory minimums that liberal judges will abuse that discretion to go soft on serious offenders.  With a raft of new Obama-appointed judges, this error will likely produce the same sort of damage we lived through during that era....

As I said, the leniency bill is a done deal in committee. What counts now is how President Trump and Majority Leader McConnell respond.

I’m cautiously optimistic that the legislation will again die on the vine, but we shouldn’t simply assume that it will. We need to watch this one closely.

Paul's analysis and criticism of the SRCA is crude in a number of particulars, mostly because he is discussing and taking issue only with Title I of the SRCA dealing with sentencing reform, while ignoring the arguably more consequential parts of the bill dealing with corrections and the creation of a national crime commission.  But I still thought it useful to reprint the thinking and rhetoric of those inclined to be against the bipartisan criminal justice reform effort moving forward in the Senate this week.

A few prior related posts:

• Sentencing Reform and Corrections Act of 2017 on the agenda for the Senate Judiciary Committee coming meeting 
• U.S. Commission on Civil Rights issues statement in support of sentencing provisions of Sentencing Reform and Corrections Act of 2017
• Is it time for new optimism or persistent pessimism on the latest prospects for statutory federal sentencing reform?
• Sentencing Reform and Corrections Act of 2017 now has 20 sponsors in the Senate but... 

UPDATE: One reason I described Paul Mirengoff's criticisms of the sentencing part of the SRCA as crude is because I thought he had his data off about the "recidivism rate for federal drug offenders" which he pegs at "around 70 percent."   I just had a chance to check his numbers aided by this big report that the US Sentencing Commission released last year titled "Recidivism Among Federal Drug Trafficking Offenders." Here is one key statistic from the report's executive summary: 

Federal drug trafficking offenders had a substantially lower recidivism rate compared to a cohort of state drug offenders released into the community in 2005 and tracked by the Bureau of Justice Statistics.  Over two-thirds (76.9%) of state drug offenders released from state prison were rearrested within five years, compared to 41.9 percent of federal drug trafficking offenders released from prison over the same five-year period.

Paul may have been thinking of the BJS report on state drug offenders when coming up with his 70 percent number, but the Commission data shows the recidivism rate to be much lower. That said, even a much lower predicated recidivism rate does not completely undercut his basis for arguing that retroactive application of sentencing reductions will "yield more crime."   By the same token, these recidivism realities themselves help make the case for corrections part of the SRCA; high rates of recidivism provide strong evidence that our prison system needs the kinds of "Recidivism reduction programming and productive activities" that appear in Title II of the SRCA.