R Street Institute Applauds House Passage of EQUAL Act
WASHINGTON (Sept. 28, 2021) — On Tuesday, the United States House of Representatives passed the Eliminating a Quantifiably Unjust Application of the Law (EQUAL) Act, H.R. 1693, under suspension by a vote of 361-66 to eliminate the federal sentencing disparity between crack cocaine and powder cocaine.
“The days of needlessly tearing families apart and wasting limited resources with no benefit to public safety—all while disproportionately impacting minority communities—must be put behind us. The previous 100-to-1 and current 18-to-1 sentencing disparity between crack cocaine and powder cocaine sentencing laws has contributed in large part to this travesty,” said R Street Institute Criminal Justice and Civil Liberties Policy Director Jillian E. Snider, a retired New York City police officer, who served in various enforcement positions including patrol, undercover vice operations, street-level narcotics, field intelligence and anti-crime.
Snider continued: “The strong bipartisan showing to right an egregious wrong that ignores decades of scientific and criminology research is evidence of just how necessary it has become to end the war on drugs that began nearly half a century ago. We applaud the House for passing the EQUAL Act and encourage the Senate to do the same.”
Learn more about the EQUAL Act here.
Image credit: lazyllama