Thread by @jallen1985

Many elected Mississippi Republicans who support criminal justice reform like @bricewigginsMS and @Sparks4Senate, as well as conservative advocates like @grantcallen, argued this year against the same sort of policies Hyde-Smith now sponsors. 1/

https://twitter.com/SenHydeSmith/status/1393217313479041029

CHS's proposed "Restoring the Armed Career Criminal Act"—in order to restore a code section ruled unconstitutional by Antonin Scalia—would impose 15-year mandatory minimum sentences for possession of a firearm by a felon with three significant prior convictions. 2/

Creating new mandatory minimum sentences is a one-size-fits-all approach—which is not a conservative approach—which strips courts of the power to consider unintended consequences and exigent circumstances that can make lengthy sentences inappropriate in particular cases. 3/

Moreover, CHS's proposed bill constitutes significant federal overreach into public safety—an area traditionally reserved to the states—with no explanation why the states cannot handle their own offenders by themselves. 4/

Next, CHS's proposed "Back the Blue Act"—which federalize criminal law regarding assaults against law enforcement officers, fire officers, and so on—contains similar flaws. 5/

The bill seems almost designed to produce disastrous unintended consequences via mandatory minimum sentences.

For example, the bill would impose a mandatory minimum 20-year sentence for assaulting a police officer with a deadly weapon.

Sounds good, right? Not so fast... 6/

Police officers around the country escort rowdy, drunk customers out of bars and restaurants every day—and a resisting-arrest citation can often result from that sort of circumstance—a misdemeanor. 7/
law.justia.com/codes/mississi…

But now imagine an elderly drunk customer has a steak knife when the officer wrests her out of her seat. The circumstance might post no real threat to the officer, and the state and local authorities might not even consider it worth charging the customer. 8/

Yet, the feds, for whatever reason they want to go after that woman, could decide to put that woman by obtaining a mandatory minimum 20-year sentence. 9/

To that end, the bill contains no explanation why the states cannot protect their own personnel or why the federal government should expand so significantly.

Both bills appear to be federal expansion for the sake of federal expansion. 🤷‍♂️ 10/