Thread by @JoshuaBHoe

Thread:

I can't tell you how disappointed I am with @CoryBooker right now.

He literally just threw every single person in prison aside from "low-level drug users" especially folks on marijuana under the bus on the #AxeFiles

Beyond upset, plus he was factually incorrect too

1. Over 50% of people in state prisons are in prison for violent crimes @CoryBooker - you do not fix Mass Incarceration without extending mercy to these folks

While many of these people may also have drug problems or mental health problems they ALSO have violent charges

2. Of those 50% of people in state prisons who are incarcerated for violent crimes, the OVERWHELMING majority are PEOPLE OF COLOR...your choice to suggest your motivation is to address racial disparity while ignoring these folks is, with respect, laughable

3. There is, in fact, no crime category I know of that isn't disproportionately applied against people of color, and you have been doing this work long enough to know better

4. Even more troubling, you claim everyone was playing politics by talking about the Marathon Bomber, but you are PLAYING POLITICS by reducing reform to ONLY certain categories of crime and people in prison.

You want the benefits of being considered a reformer but not the cost

5. In essence, you replicated, in about two minutes, every single policy that resulted in the criticism @jformanjr levied against DC @EricHolder and @BarackObama

6. And perhaps most disturbing, you doubled down on the mythology connecting VOTING and INCARCERATION...A) the Constitution does not make this argument (it leaves it to the states to decide suggesting they have the right to deny voting rights)

6 B) And your argument against @BernieSanders was HORRIBLE, if Vermont has 11% African Americans in their prisons (as you claimed), why should WHITE folks who did time in Vermont be able to vote while Black folks in Georgia for the same offense cannot?

6 C) Judges don't sentence people to losing their right to vote....that is a political question. In fact, courts have held that people in prison don't lose all of their rights, so why would you enforce taxation w/o representation @CoryBooker?

6 D) And why should folks be able to, for instance, publish a book from prison but not vote? Why is this the right folks should lose @CoryBooker

6 E) And given the conditions of confinement crisis in Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas, North Carolina and many other states...having a voice is CRITICAL, might even be life or death

6 F) And for God's sake what is the policy argument against voting - not how you feel about it, why it has been proven to be a bad idea - I have evidence it actually is a crime fighting tool and reduces recidivism

7. Anyway, as someone who is a formerly incarcerated registrant WHO CAN VOTE, I wonder how Michigan manages to stay in one piece. What it does mean is that I can actually talk to legislators and have impact on policies that might affect my life. REPRESENTATION matters

8. when you suggest the system works but only fails ______ (insert politically acceptable population) you MISS THE POINT, the system fails PERIOD, prison is criminogenic, collateral consequences are counterproductive, suppression of votes is counterproductive and racialized

9. Very disappointed

FIN