GROUPS TO HOYER, McCARTHY: “NOW IS THE MOMENT FOR CONGRESS TO COMPLETE THIS WORK.”

Leading Right, Left and Center Groups Come Together to Urge Hoyer, McCarthy to Schedule a Floor Vote to End Drug Sentencing Disparity

Justice Action Network’s Holly Harris: “We can’t miss the chance to right this historic wrong.”

(Washington, DC) – Today, 37 of the country’s leading criminal justice reform and advocacy organizations wrote to House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy expressing their support for the Equal Act, a bill that would fully and finally eliminate the federal sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine offenses. The bill has broad, bipartisan support in the House, from the Freedom Caucus to the Progressive Caucus, and support from major law enforcement groups.

The groups urged Hoyer and McCarthy to complete the work of eliminating the sentencing disparity, which was reduced from 100:1 to 18:1 by the Fair Sentencing Act, and applied retroactively by the First Step Act.

“We urge House leadership to listen to the 50 members of both parties who have reached across the aisle, to law enforcement groups who have spoken out in favor of this bill, and to the groups from the far right to the far left and everywhere in between who joined together today to urge them to bring the EQUAL Act to the floor for a vote,” said Holly Harris, President and Executive Director of the Justice Action Network, the country’s largest organization focused on bipartisan criminal justice reform legislation and advocacy.

“This kind of support for a bill doesn’t come along much these days, and the legislative branch has a way of letting its moment pass. We can’t miss the chance to right this historic wrong. The votes and political support are there. We urge Leaders McCarthy and Hoyer to move this bill as quickly as possible.”

The letter was signed by groups from across the political spectrum, including ALEC Action, American Civil Liberties Union, Americans for Prosperity, Americans for Tax Reform, Association of Prosecuting Attorneys, Black Public Defender Association, Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, Catholic Mobilizing Network, Catholic Prison Ministries Coalition, Center for American Progress, Center for Public Justice, Digital Liberty, Dream Corps JUSTICE, Drug Policy Alliance, Due Process Institute, Empower Mississippi, FAMM, Fair Trials, Federal Public and Community Defenders, FreedomWorks, Georgia Center for Opportunity, Innocence Project, Jesuit Conference Office of Justice and Ecology, Justice Action Network, Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, NAACP, National Association for Public Defense, National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, National District Attorneys Association, National Latino Evangelical Coalition, National Legal Aid & Defender Association, Pegasus Institute, Prison Fellowship, R Street Institute, The Sentencing Project, Taxpayers Protection Alliance and Tzedek Association.

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September 16, 2021

Dear Leader Hoyer and Leader McCarthy,

We, the undersigned organizations, write in strong support of the EQUAL Act, H.R. 1693, introduced by Reps. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), Bobby Scott (D-VA), Kelly Armstrong (R-ND), and Don Bacon (R-NE) and cosponsored by Members across the ideological spectrum. The EQUAL Act would end the federal prison sentence disparity between crack cocaine and powdered cocaine offenses—that is not grounded in evidence and contributes to overincarceration, particularly within communities of color.

As you know, the First Step Act was landmark legislation that included long overdue sentencing reforms. It was a generational moment during which Democratic and Republican members came together to overwhelmingly pass criminal justice reform legislation. The House has the opportunity to continue this vital work. On July 21, the EQUAL Act was passed by the House Judiciary Committee in a strong, bipartisan vote of 36-5, with Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) and Ranking Member Jim Jordan (R-OH) voting in support of the legislation. Now is the time for Congress to end the unwarranted disparity between crack and powder cocaine. by passing the legislation on the House floor.

In 1986, Congress created a 100-to-1 sentencing disparity between the treatment of crack cocaine offenses and powdered cocaine offenses—despite the fact that these substances are two forms of the same drug, and one is no more harmful than the other.1 As a result of that law, five grams of crack cocaine carried the same mandatory minimum prison sentence as 500 grams of powdered cocaine.

This unjust disparity, which has failed to keep communities safe, has, in turn, created obvious and harmful racial disparities. According to United States Sentencing Commission data, 83.0 percent of those who were sentenced for federal crack cocaine offenses were Black in FY2010.2 Four years after enactment of the disparity, the average federal drug sentence for Black defendants was 49 percent higher than the average for White defendants.3 Moreover, as the United States Sentencing Commission pointed out, even the perception of “improper racial disparity fosters disrespect for and lack of confidence in the criminal justice system” in marginalized communities, weakening the legitimacy of law enforcement and the judiciary rely on in their public service.

Congress has already taken bipartisan action to partially address this injustice. In 2010, Congress passed the Fair Sentencing Act, which reduced the disparity from 100-to-1 to 18-to-1, but only applied the reform to pending and future cases. The First Step Act of 2018 finally made this change retroactive. Of the 3,705 people who received retroactive relief under the First Step Act, 91.6 percent were Black.5 Included in this group was Matthew Charles, whose story of faith inspires resilience and whose pursuit of second chances inspires Americans from all walks of life.

However, now is the moment for Congress to complete this work. Enhanced mandatory minimums for crack cocaine still more acutely impact Black Americans. In FY 2020, 76.8 percent of people sentenced for crack cocaine offenses were Black,7 despite available data from around the same time showing that White Americans accounted for 70.2 percent of those who used crack cocaine in 2018.8 Over forty states do not treat crack cocaine and powder cocaine differently in their sentencing structures.9 By passing the EQUAL Act and reducing overincarceration in federal prisons, Congress would free up resources better directed to violence reduction strategies, support for crime survivors, and other proven public safety interventions for underserved communities.

The EQUAL Act would finally equalize the treatment of crack cocaine and powdered cocaine offenses. Importantly, the bill also makes this relief potentially retroactive following individualized case review by federal courts in order to ensure the law has the ameliorative effect Congress intends. The EQUAL Act would not only advance consistent sentencing moving forward; it would address to some degree the unjust punishments of the past.

This critical bicameral bill corrects misguided policymaking from 35 years ago and would continue the important bipartisan progress Congress is making on creating more effective, more efficient, and more fair federal sentencing laws. We urge Members to support the EQUAL Act when it comes to the House floor for consideration.

If you have any questions, please contact Jason Pye of the Due Process Institute at Jason@iDueProcess.org or (202) 558-6686 or David Jimenez of Prison Fellowship at David_Jimenez@pfm.org or (412) 320-0766.

Sincerely,

ALEC Action

FreedomWorks

American Civil Liberties Union

Georgia Center for Opportunity

Americans for Prosperity

Innocence Project

Americans for Tax Reform

Jesuit Conference, Office of Justice and Ecology

Association of Prosecuting Attorneys

Justice Action Network

Black Public Defender Association

Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights

Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law

NAACP

Catholic Mobilizing Network

National Association for Public Defense

Catholic Prison Ministries Coalition

National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers

Center for American Progress

National District Attorneys Association

Center for Public Justice

National Latino Evangelical Coalition

Digital Liberty

National Legal Aid & Defender Association

Dream Corps JUSTICE