Advocates for criminal justice reform are pushing Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to advance a bill that would eliminate the longstanding sentencing disparities in place for people found guilty of possessing crack cocaine versus powder cocaine. The bill, known as the Eliminating a Quantifiably Unjust Application of the Law, or EQUAL Act, would end the practice of slapping people convicted .
A bill that would have erased long-standing racial disparities in federal drug crimes failed to clear the Senate, disappointing thousands of people in prison and their families.
The Senate failed to advance a bill that would have reduced one of the most persistent racial disparities in criminal justice: punishment for crack cocaine.(Story aired on ATC on Jan. 9, 2023.)
Merrick Garland has taken action to end sentencing disparities that have imposed harsher penalties for different forms of cocaine and worsened racial inequity.