Kamala Harris sidestepped a question on Sunday about whether she supported California’s Proposition 36, a contentious ballot measure that increases sentences for certain drug and theft crimes.
“I am not gonna talk about the vote on that because, honestly, it’s the Sunday before the election and I don’t intend to create an endorsement one way or the other,” the U.S. vice president and Democratic presidential nominee, who votes in California, told reporters at a Detroit rally.
Harris’s record on criminal justice, from her time as San Francisco district attorney to her tenure as California attorney general, has faced significant scrutiny, with critics arguing she has adapted her stance based on the political climate.
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If approved, Proposition 36 would impose jail time on individuals failing drug treatment, increase penalties for certain theft and drug crimes—reclassifying some misdemeanors as felonies—and require courts to warn convicted drug sellers that repeated offenses leading to a death could result in murder charges.
California’s nonpartisan legislative fiscal and policy adviser has warned that the measure could drive up state criminal justice costs by requiring some offenders who would otherwise serve sentences at the county level to serve them in state prisons and by increasing state court workloads.
“In total, Proposition 36 would increase local criminal justice costs, likely by tens of millions of dollars annually,” the advisory board noted.
The measure has sparked a divisive debate, especially as major California cities like San Francisco and Los Angeles grapple with rising homelessness, drug addiction, and related crime rates.
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San Francisco Mayor London Breed, a Democrat, is also facing a challenging re-election race, with critics accusing her of failing to manage the city’s issues effectively. Breed’s four main opponents on the November 5 ballot, all Democrats, argue that she has let San Francisco slip into disorder, citing rising homelessness and erratic street behavior while businesses, plagued by burglaries, cry out for assistance.
Crime statistics from the Public Policy Institute of California indicate a steady rise in shoplifting in the San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles from 2021 to 2022. Although shoplifting rates increased statewide during this period, they remain below pre-pandemic 2019 levels, though commercial burglaries and robberies are more common in urban counties.
Proposition 36 also seeks to undo parts of Proposition 47, a 2014 initiative aimed at reducing prison overcrowding by reclassifying certain felonies as misdemeanors. Many law enforcement officials argue that Proposition 47 contributed to rising crime and homelessness. Harris, in 2014, chose not to endorse Proposition 47, and when asked about recreational marijuana legalization, reportedly laughed at the question. By 2018, she reversed her stance, asserting that “strongly people should not be going to jail for smoking weed.”
“I just think we have come to a point where we have to understand that we need to legalize it and stop criminalizing this behavior,” Harris remarked last month on the podcast All the Smoke.
The Los Angeles Times recently criticized Proposition 36, cautioning that it risks a return to the “three strikes and you’re out” policies that led to lengthy sentences for some minor repeat offenses. “The problems the measure claims to address – retail theft, drug abuse and homelessness – are to some degree intertwined,” the newspaper commented, adding that the proposition effectively endorses current police practices.
“Police could stop petty thieves now if they made misdemeanor arrests, as they can and sometimes should under current law. But they don’t, because they argue it’s not worth their time,” the Times said.
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