Trump backs bipartisan criminal justice reform
President Donald Trump on Wednesday endorsed a criminal justice deal taking shape in Congress, giving a boost to the measure even as it faces a cool reception in the Senate from Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
It’s unclear whether the package, which includes sentencing reform provisions that divide the Senate Republican Caucus, would get through the Senate. Reformers like Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) back the legislation, while others like Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) call it a “jailbreak” bill, and some prominent liberal Democrats have yet to lend their support to the agreement.
Yet the president sounded hopeful on Wednesday.
“Today’s announcement shows that true bipartisanship is possible — and maybe it’ll be thriving,” Trump said of the prison and sentencing reform bill during an event at the White House with Republican members of Congress who back the effort.
“Go out and see if you can get that done and if you can, I’m waiting, I’m waiting with a pen,” Trump instructed the lawmakers, adding: “It’s the right thing to do.”
McConnell isn’t making any commitments to move a criminal justice proposal in the lame-duck session, saying Wednesday that he needs to see final legislative language, then gauge support for the bill among his 51-member caucus and then see whether the Senate has time to squeeze it onto the calendar. Congress must fund a quarter of the government by Dec. 7 and McConnell also wants to finish the long-stalled farm bill before year’s end.
“We need to take a whip count and see where we stand. And then weigh it against the other things that absolutely have to be accomplished,” McConnell told reporters. “We don’t have a whole lot of time left.”
The majority leader also dislikes heading into fights that so obviously divide Republicans. In addition to Cotton’s scorched-earth campaign against the bill, Republican Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana has criticized his state’s Democratic governor for pursuing criminal justice reform there while weighing his own run for the office.
“Put me down as doubtful” about the agreement’s prospects, Kennedy said earlier Wednesday, before Trump’s thumbs-up.
The criminal justice package adds four provisions changing federal sentencing to a prisons bill that passed the House with more than 130 Democratic votes in May. Among those negotiated sentencing changes are lower mandatory minimums for drug-related offenses and the addition of retroactivity to a 2010 law that closed the sentencing disparity for crack and cocaine offenses.
Trump’s son-in-law and adviser, Jared Kushner, is leading the internal White House efforts in favor of the agreement. The president praised Kushner during Wednesday’s White House event. “He worked very hard and he feels very deeply about it,” Trump said of his son-in law.
Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Minority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), who have taken a leading role in their respective parties in negotiating on the criminal justice package, hailed Trump’s remarks Wednesday in a statement that referred to McConnell’s vow earlier this year to take up the criminal justice deal if it could win at least 60 votes.
“With the president’s support and Leader McConnell’s pledge to hold a vote on the broadly popular package, we can quickly take a critical first step towards reforming our criminal justice system,” Grassley and Durbin said.
The White House has been in regular contact with McConnell’s office about finding floor time for the bill. A White House official said Trump administration aides initially hoped to move the bill before the election, but McConnell decided to wait until after it was over.
“We’ll see what happens. There are other things that will compete for time on the floor. But I am optimistic that we will clear over 60 votes,” the official said, adding later, “Our goal is to try to get it done as quickly as possible. … We’re going to push very hard to see if we can bring it home.”
Kushner spoke with Cotton on Wednesday ahead of Trump’s endorsement announcement, the White House official said, adding that aides will continue to talk to him. “We welcome his feedback, but again he’s one vote,” the official said before expressing some hope that the White House can allay some of Cotton’s concerns. “I’d like to figure out to what degree we can get him on board, if that’s possible,” the official said.
And one of the measure’s most influential backers, Sen. Paul, is joined in his criminal justice advocacy efforts by his wife, Kelley, who visited Capitol Hill on Wednesday to help rally support for the legislation.
“It would be so important right now, especially in this time of incredible division, to have a bipartisan bill pass that helps people from all walks of life,” Kelley Paul said in an interview after meeting with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas).
However, it remains to be seen how comprehensive Democratic support is for the package. Some in the party may believe that a Democratic House takeover next year could lead to a better outcome for the left by nudging the GOP to the table on stronger sentencing reform.
“I’m in favor of comprehensive criminal justice reform. My only question is, is this big enough?” asked Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.).
Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), like Warren a potential 2020 presidential contender for his party, on Wednesday declined to weigh in on where he stands on the measure, saying that he’s “in a lot of conversations about the bill right now.“
Sen. Roy Blunt of Missouri, a member of GOP leadership, said he supports the effort but gave a yellow light to its prospects for quick movement. The final scope of the deal and its extent of GOP support are “not inconsequential things to find out before you move forward,” Blunt said.
