Biden Administration to Endorse Bill Ending Disparity in Sentencing for Crack Cocaine
The bill brings President Joe Biden closer to fulfilling campaign promises and closing the disparities in drug convictions.
Landwebs
The Joe Biden administration plans to endorse legislation that would end the disparity in sentences between crack and powder cocaine offenses that Biden helped create decades ago, reports the Washington Post. At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Tuesday, Regina LaBelle, the acting director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, plans to express the administration’s support for the Eliminating a Quantifiably Unjust Application of the Law Act, or Equal Act, which would eliminate the sentencing disparity and give people who were convicted or sentenced for a federal cocaine offense a re-sentencing.
Biden’s shift reflects broader changes in the way elected officials have talked about drug offenses and criminal justice over time, especially among the Democratic Party. For Biden, supporting the bill is a follow-through on a campaign promise and a step toward fulfilling it.
