REFORMING OUR NATION’S BROKEN CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM AND ADDRESSING GUN VIOLENCE

Bobby has spent his career in public service advancing evidence-based criminal justice reform.  He led efforts as a freshman congressman against the 1994 Crime Bill that helped create our nation’s mass incarceration problem and destroyed countless families and communities.  

In 2010, Bobby authored and led efforts in the House of Representatives to pass the Fair Sentencing Act, which reduced the crack cocaine-powder cocaine sentencing disparities.  When President Obama signed Bobby’s bill into law, it was the first time in a generation that Congress had successfully reduced a mandatory minimum sentence.

In 2013, Bobby introduced the Death in Custody Reporting Act, which updated a 2000 law that Bobby co-authored.  The Death in Custody Reporting Act requires federal, state and local law enforcement agencies to report deaths that occur in prisons and jails, as well as deaths that occur in the course of an arrest.  Bobby’s Death in Custody Act was signed into law in December 2014 by President Obama.  Despite the Trump Administration's refusal to implement the law, Bobby continues to fight to hold law enforcement agencies accountable for unnecessary and unjustified deaths that occur in their custody. 

In 2015, Bobby introduced the Safe, Accountable, Fair, and Effective (SAFE) Justice Act -- one of the the most comprehensive, bipartisan, evidence-based criminal justice reform efforts to ever be introduced in Congress.  Bobby’s bill would effectively eliminate mandatory minimum sentences, expand drug courts and other diversionary programs, reduce recidivism, reduce crime and save taxpayers billions of dollars, and reinvest those significant savings back into our communities through evidence-based prevention and intervention programs.  Key provisions of Bobby’s SAFE Justice Act, including retroactive application of the Fair Sentencing Act and a fix to good-time credits for prisoners, were included in the First STEP Act, which was signed into law by President Trump in December 2018. 

Bobby has also fought to improve our nation’s Juvenile Justice system.  Bobby’s Juvenile Justice Reform Act was signed into law by President Trump in December 2018.  This long overdue update to the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act is helping communities across the country better serve at-risk youth and young people in the criminal justice system.  The Juvenile Justice Reform Act also included core provisions of Bobby’s Youth Prison Reduction through Opportunities, Mentoring, Intervention, Support, and Education (PROMISE) Act to provide communities with additional resources to implement evidence-based youth violence prevention and intervention programs and strategies.

Bobby knows that much more work needs to be done to make our criminal justice system fairer and more just. Bobby remains committed to comprehensive sentencing reform, a total elimination of mandatory minimums, and implementing evidence-based prevention and intervention programs and strategies.

Bobby has also led efforts to address our nation’s gun violence epidemic.  In Congress, he serves as a vice chair of the House Democratic Caucus’ Gun Violence Prevention Task Force.  Thanks to Bobby’s leadership, the House of Representatives passed the Bipartisan Background Checks Act and the Enhanced Background Checks Act.