 Good afternoon everyone. Welcome to the fourth and final session of the public policy and institutional discrimination discussion series where today's topic is lobbying and mass incarceration. For those who may not know me, I am Stephanie Sanders of Ford Schools Diversity Officer and also a lecturer. And for starters, I'd like to just take a few minutes to talk about the goal of the series, and also the format of today's event. The goal of the series is to one create opportunities for engagement, and this gives faculty staff and students of course an opportunity to get to know faculty, and their policy engagement interest, and also their research beyond the classroom. A second goal of this series is to foster dialogue on important issues of US public policy, which is why we're here today. Today's discussion for today is Mr. Broderick Johnson, who we are excited to join us today, and he will lead today's discussion, and he will speak about the topic of lobbying and mass incarceration for the first 30 minutes of today's session. And the last 20 minutes of today's discussion will be reserved for questions and answers so we hope it to be a very engaging and interactive session today. And during this time, participants are surely invited to make use of the chat box, or also use the raise hand feature and wait to be recognized so that you can pose questions directly to Mr. Johnson. And without further ado, I'd like to take this time to introduce. Mr. Johnson, who is a Ford School, Towsley policymaker in residence at the Ford School. Mr. Johnson has an extensive resume but I'll try to capture what important elements of it for today's purposes. So Mr. Johnson is a public policy and political strategist with more than three decades of leadership at the highest levels of government and the legal He provides strategic leadership advice and counsel to clients on legislative, regulatory, legal and political issues. Mr. Johnson has the distinction of having been appointed to senior posts under two US presidents. He served as assistant to the president and cabinet secretary under President Barack Obama. And in that role, he was the president's primary liaison to members of the cabinet, where he directed a team that helped coordinate policy and communication strategies between the West Wing and federal agencies. President Obama also appointed Mr. Johnson the chairman of the White houses, my brother's keeper task force. So this is an interagency initiative designed to identify and address the disparities that hamper the success of boys and young men of color, and to improve the lives of all youth. And in the Clinton White House, Mr. Johnson was the deputy assistant to the president for legislative affairs. Finally, Mr. Johnson has also served on a number of senior positions on Capitol Hill, beginning in the House Office of the Legislative Council where he drafted such landmark legislation as the family and medical leave act and the immigration reform and control act of 1986. So please help me welcome Towsley policymaker and resident, Mr. Broderick Johnson. At this time, Mr. Johnson, you can please share your screen and unmute your microphone. Thank you very much and Stephanie you can see my screen yes. All right. There we go. Thank you very much Stephanie for a very generous introduction and for the opportunity to, to again be in the presence of Wolverines really miss being an Ann Arbor has been way too long. I mean we're all, you know being so affected, of course by this pandemic in so many ways, things that we love to do people we love to see but things now certainly are getting better. And I look forward to the opportunity to be in Ann Arbor and on campus. Hopefully, no later than this fall, at least to come to the big house and to visit the Ford School than the law school as well and look. I'm delighted that I see some friends, friends of, of, I won't say many years because she might chafe at this but Cindy banks. Cindy bank I see you're here and it's great to see you send the and a lot of love your way. She's a great friend and I also noticed that there's a one of my former students from the Ford School. Of course I taught last semester is here as well so Ben's great to see you there maybe maybe others as well. I think that that they're here and Ben's case because it means he really look forward to seeing me and it's not great dependent that he's here so doesn't add to his class participation. He did very well nonetheless so again it's it's real honor to be here and by the way of our NCAA for a big 10 tournament, starting tomorrow so it's all very exciting and I look forward to that as a nice diversion from what otherwise has been a long time not being able to have the have supports Michigan sports be something that can bring great joy or sometimes disappointment away. We're going to talk about mass incarceration and lobbying efforts and let me let me start here with sort of an introduction slide. I teach courses here at the Ford School and at the law school from time to time that examine the intersection between effective lobbying. The tools that are used by lobbyists limits everyone lobbying the ethics, those are both legal and moral considerations. How all that intersects with the crisis of mass incarceration in the United States. As you all know criminal justice reform, especially concerning how we address specifically mass incarceration has become one of the dominant domestic policy issues at both the federal and state levels. So it has emerged somewhat surprisingly I think, as a, an issue of bipartisan concern we've been seen Democrats and Republicans work on these issues as well as independence in ways that lacking with respect to many other public public policy issues. One of the key dividing lines though has been drawn over whether or not incremental change is a better strategy for addressing criminal justice reform and mass incarceration, versus some more comprehensive approach that would necessitate really ripping out the system from its roots. And so this dichotomy that dynamic is a conflict that continues to raise that rage at the federal level and also at state and local levels. So, let's begin with this undeniable thesis. And it is a very regrettable one. And it has presented great challenges and has caused great harm on the United States by far leads the world in incarcerating its citizens. Mass incarceration has destroyed many lives ripped apart many families and communities done terrible harm to our economy and further undermine undermined faith in our justice system. We know there are double and triple standards. The lack of mass incarceration on individuals and communities of color has been especially pernicious. So we look at these particular critical questions. When did we begin to get here to the system of mass incarceration, you know what were the origins. I'm sure some of you if not all of you have read the new Jim Crow Michelle Alexander's incredible book that traces. Mass incarceration, all the way back in her view to the origins and slavery and the emergence and reemergence of racial class system as after racial class system after racial class system, which was further fueled by the so called war of drugs that began in earnest in this country in the 1970s and accelerated through the 80s and 90s and continued through beginning of this century and even continues today. Our thesis is that at its core, this system has been driven by race and racial animus. It's been directed by politicians who have insisted on harsh sentences, like three strikes, three strikes laws and excess excessively long sentences, mandatory minimums, and even death penalties, all very much associated with the so called war on and the many of these politicians over the course of time and through these different racial caste systems have been able to come up with sort of a race neutral approach, or name root race neutral messaging. And yet the results of this system have hardly been race neutral by by anyone's, I think by anyone's understanding. So we have this also irrefutable fact that hard data, cold data tells us the impact of this system, especially with regard to people of color, just to highlight a few things here. And again, these these are shocking numbers this is data that nevertheless is irrefutable. So here we are the United States, we're home to 5% of the world's population but 25% of the world's prisoners. Our incarceration is four times higher than that of China. In 1980, there were 500,000 people behind bars in America. Half a million people that isn't in 1980. Today there are 2.2 million people. And there's been some somewhat of a reduction over the past year but the numbers are still staggering and well above 2 million. It has quadrupled then since 1980. Every year we spend $80 billion to keep people incarcerated at the federal level. Again, put that in perspective, $80 billion. Roughly a third of the Justice Department's budget goes toward incarceration of people and in terms of racial disparities. African Americans, the Latinos make up 30% of our population but 60% of our incarcerated population about one in every 35 African American men, one in every 88 Latino men serving time right now. Quite a disparity relative to white men where the number is one and 214 although interestingly enough that number that ratio has been increasing. And a couple of other things that are not on the slide in terms of the numbers that go again to the disparities. One million dads are in prison and one out of every nine African American kids has a father in prison. Again, one million fathers are in prison and one out of every nine African American kids have a dad in prison. So you have to you know even now especially you have to say how did so many political leaders and other leaders, even religious leaders and many in the African American community allow this to develop. Couldn't they see the handwriting on the wall when they were supporting laws in the 70s and 80s and 90s. That tough, tough and sentencing that took away the ability of prosecutors and judges to be someone late lenient, or at least a better understand circumstances of people that they were indicting or that they were sending to prison. Was it naivete, was it uncaring sort of heart in the cases of many of these leaders. That's certainly one side of the argument that some people project. So it's also important from standpoint of looking at the reality of what was happening in these communities during these times, especially in the 70s, 80s and 90s, when because of the explosion of crack cocaine, and so called angel dust. We saw, really, we saw violence, fueled drug activity and drug trades in many of these communities of color and for many of these leaders and they were so deeply concerned about the impact of drugs and violence in their own communities that they were willing to, to propose and also to support some pretty harsh sentencing, though that has led to, again, mass incarceration that's disproportionately affected communities of color and men of color and African American men even more specifically. The system of mass incarceration let's talk a little bit about who has benefited from the system, sadly. I have a question that there have been beneficiaries of it politicians, there are many politicians who, because of being able to exploit the conditions in many communities, especially in many urban communities have been able to ride political success, based on their calls for law and order, and they've been able then to exploit fears about race and class for their own benefit. They've been able to use enforcement entities. As a result of the tools available for mass for for incarcerating people. They've been able to benefit from the power and resources for purposes of personnel and equipment as a result of this system. Communities where prisons are located jobs and economic stability have come to many of those communities have been maintained in many of those communities. Another way to look at this though is that there are many communities there are many communities in the urban parts of this country that have become more safe, certainly as a result of this massive locking up of people. Now there's been of course a tremendous price to pay with, say the absence of many men of color in those communities as a result of this. There's no question there are communities in this country that are that have been said they're now safer than they were before we saw many of these policies put into place. The private prison industry has certainly seen over the last several decades. We've had a bit of a roller coaster though depending on who's in office, but increases and contracts for federal and state procurement agreements. And those have certainly in where those contracts have certainly been been put in place we've seen benefits for their executives, their employees and their investors. Again it really can depend largely on which party is as an office to an Obama years. It was certainly tougher for private the private prison industry because we essentially put a bar in place with regard to the use of private prisons in many instances, something that was lifted during the Trump years, and will be different under the Biden administration. I would just point out here the phone phone companies are among some phone companies are among those that have benefited from the system in as much as they've been able to get away with charging really high rates for phone communications between incarcerated and their families, families that certainly in many situations could by no means be able to afford being able to communicate that way and there have been efforts at the FCC to address this but again it has been a bit of a partisan issue. So, this is not to say that, you know in some of these instance for example the communities where people have jobs as a result of prisons being in their communities that there's something evil and nefarious here. It's just to say that there are those communities and those groups that have benefited as a result of the system of mass incarceration and the locking up of so many people. I just want to go to those that have been harmed most by mass incarceration some of this is quite obvious. When you look at the statistics in terms of the increases in incarceration rates for adults and juveniles. Certainly what's happened with respect to men of color and women of color. And the families of those incarcerated, the impact of mass incarceration on children is clear and shameful and undeniable. The impacts on those children can't be understated, as well as the economic impact of our system of mass incarceration, the locking up of breadwinners men and women who would otherwise be in a position to support their families certainly better than they otherwise are able to do without incarceration when they're not just during their incarceration but even afterwards. One way to think about mass incarceration by the way is it's it also leads to sort of I'd call it lasting incarceration, the impact of someone being being incarcerated can of course impact them on their entire lives, whether it have to do with jobs economic opportunities. The, the, the stature the last lack of stature of all the stigmas that are associated as well. Also, clearly communities of especially urban communities where the loss of many people, whether it be the sons and the husbands and the alcohols and the grandfathers and the grandmothers and any other people who are important in those communities and perhaps because of drug related issues ended up not because they were dealing drugs but perhaps because they had drug problems ended up no longer being in those communities and that's had a, of course a horrible impact as well for judges and prosecutors. They're losing their discretion and their ability to be able to discern whether or not someone should face this kind of punishment for what they did versus that kind of punishment or this rehabilitation rather than punishment at all. We've put a tremendous burden on judges and prosecutors and we have overstaffed prison administrators and and prison staff as well for employers who struggle to try to find, particularly if they're based in urban areas trying to find employees to help them run their business successfully, then finally taxpayers the incredible amounts of money the taxpayers see put into a system to lock people up rather than, than being in a position of seeing their friends and their neighbors and their community members of being able to contribute to to the local and also our national economy. With respect to the issue of who drove mass incarceration I just want to make this point. I mentioned the Michelle Alexander book. There's another book that I've actually been as aware of this that I've used in my classes as well because it gives a different perspective in terms of sort of the Michelle Alexander approach or analysis of who drove mass incarceration. Professor James Foreman has written a book it's been out for several years called locking up our own. It's a book that looks at what happened in Washington DC through the 60s the 70s 80s and and 90s and really into the turn of the century. It relates to the policies, the police practices, the approach of politicians in a city that over time certainly throughout those decades became a city with with more black leadership with dominant black leadership. I think that we saw incredible rise in incarceration rates during those times and the title of this book is so suggestive of this notion of answering this question of who drove mass incarceration because he points to the fact again that many African American leaders in DC were for policies that have led to mass incarceration, particularly of African American men in Washington DC and. So again going back to what I said before what, what drove that was it I even take was it was it just kind of for political expedience. Having been in DC through these periods and knowing some of the people who were involved in in these policies and these prosecutions. Thinking about the conditions that were that we faced in DC at the time that led to surgeon violence in DC. Close to the murder capital of the country a lot of that driven by the the impact of crack cocaine and other drugs in the nation's capital. And then of course the influx of the tragic influx of guns in the nation's capital. And all of that contributed to this notion of, of black folks, black leaders, driving mass incarceration and locking up our own so to speak I would certainly recommend came form as well for that analysis because it does frame then, how one should think what will take to turn around the system of mass incarceration. Who do we need to appeal to. And what do we need to lead with in terms of kind of the thesis, or the theory of the case, what do you have to think about in terms of which leadership, you can turn around on these issues, or who you need to be helping to lead these efforts. If you start with sort of a notion that this is also based in in racism which, in many fundamental ways of course it is. Does it make it tougher to be able to appeal though to certain groups, especially on the right, or especially in the Republican Party or especially perhaps among conservative Democrats in order to make a difference and then just thinking about the general public and how the general public sees things as well so that affects, again, how you lobby on these issues and thinking about how you appeal to different people to get involved in it is a moral argument is a legalistic argument is and an argument that's based kind of, even on the notion of black folks making sure we are better taken care of our own of our own children and families. As we address these issues. All this data, all the data is what I pointed to earlier is of course very important and data fuels debates and discussions, but it's also so important again from the standpoint of how you effectively lobbying on these issues to think about how you can project individual groups that will move public policymakers and move the general public in terms of how they think about the necessity to change things. You know this is sort of what we refer to in Washington oftentimes when we're talking about a public policy campaign is who are the real people who want to speak that you can bring into the debate that you can talk about again that can convince the public and convince policymakers convince politicians that they should care about addressing an issue especially an issue as difficult as this one can be. And that's that's very, very tricky because you know it's very hard to bring a degree of sympathy to people who are who have been incarcerated for for crimes that many people would say, you know, kind of like kind of get it, but you really didn't need to do that did you and you should pay a price for the for the crimes that you commit. So I want to talk about this, a specific example here of something that I've struggled with the show man in this photograph spent five years in a federal prison for Douglas distribution back in the mid to late 90s. He got a mandatory minimum sentence. He had no prior record before he was arrested. He had lived in a homeless shelter throughout high school in the District of Columbia with his mom, his mom and had drug related problems. And that's how they ended up in in a homeless shelter. He was a student at Howard University. When he was arrested he was a junior at Howard University when he when he was arrested. I know personally, this photograph that you see here, which is quite compelling to seal their president behind has nothing to do with the photograph that's kind of the way I guess it must have been taken for purposes of this must have had it in my focus because there's a personal element, strong personal element to the story for me. The young man was a mentee of mine. I met him when he was in the shelter. And I was a leader of a program that that reached out to to young people who lived in homeless shelters to try to help them with their with their educational and social needs. He was the oldest of the of the kids who were living in that shelter these this was a big family shelter in Washington DC. He was a mentor to him and he became very close to my family so close to my family. The reason he's wearing the tuxedo and photograph is that this is actually at our wedding in 1993 he was one of the one of the ushers that our wedding he was very close to us. I read the description of what happened to him. Again, he had never been involved in any drug related crime in fact I remember him saying on a number of occasions because of the impact of drugs on on his family life, and on his mother that he thought drug dealers should get the death penalty. And what was shocking then, and I had no idea that he would ever do anything that would involve either drug use or drug distribution so was shocking when I got the news that he had been arrested, and that he was facing a mandatory minimum sentence. He was walking through an airport and Cincinnati and he was profiled and some officers followed him and they suspected him of having drugs in his knapsack. And to make a long story short, he was arrested after he landed back in Washington DC and they'd gone through through his package back in Cincinnati, and the DA arrested him. He's been out of prison for a number of years now but he was not able to finish getting his degree that he was so close to obtaining and his life has been affected considerably. Now, if you're trying to though project a story of someone for for issues around mass incarceration and the impact of my mass incarceration. And this is the story you know, you want to be able to tell when it challenges is whether or not this story, for example, having this young man be a witness at a hearing or taking him around on Capitol Hill to meetings with with members of Congress to talk about the for for sentencing reform for prison reform for criminal justice reform. Is this going to be the story that is going to draw the kind of empathy you need or instead is it going to be sort of the story of say a white woman who committed a similar offense who was caught carrying opioids illegally. So those are some of the calculations that you that you have to make if you're trying to lobby on these issues. But you would hope that a story is compelling as this young man's story would be able to move public opinion as well and that's one of the real challenges that we that we face when we're trying to work on issues as difficult as as as the issue of criminal justice reform and mass incarceration. And with something that happened that during 2017 and 2018 that was was a good story. Some people would say that it wasn't enough that Congress and the White House, the Trump administration work together in order to be able to get the first step act passed but there was a debate and a successful debate on 2017 and 2018 US House of Representatives and the US Senate passed the first step act and that became law and it's had an impact on thousands of people who are incarcerated in their families. Again, some people would say it didn't go nearly enough that there are lots of issues that have to do with what happens after someone has been released from prison. There are also issues that have to do with preventing people from being in those circumstances in the, in the first place, but we saw this incredible army so to speak of advocacy groups, both business groups, including even the, even coke industries that got very involved in the push for for criminal justice reform. The US prisoner prisoners rights groups got very involved even many law enforcement organizations got involved. Civil and human rights groups got involved, religious organizations of course making more more a moral argument or religiously based moral argument. You saw many coalitions of these organizations getting together to work on these issues, and they were successful in being able to move the needle considerably and getting something done that again, took a lot of effort but has had had a real impact. And it shows that, you know, you, there are ways to build center right center left coalitions business groups working with civil and human rights organizations from time to time. And on these issues in a very surprising way, there's a lot left to be done after this and so one of the big questions is, what comes next, the Biden administration has made clear it wants to continue to further criminal justice reform along. The members of both parties who continue, certainly talk about the need for it. We will see though when you look at the stack of major initiatives, whether it's the passage of the covert relief bill that will be signed into law tomorrow, and you look at infrastructure which is a major next initiative out of this administration, as well as issues around climate change and the like words criminal justice reform rank among the priorities. And at what point can we see really further change, further momentum for more changes on criminal justice reform at the federal level. So the last thing I would say here is perhaps we shouldn't look at the federal level anyway in terms of where the major changes need to be made. There have been a lot of reform successful reform efforts done to the state level, and those will continue. Some are driven by state budgets, for example, at least in the minds of some who are pushing for changes at the state because of the impact of mass incarceration on their budgets. And businesses in many states have gotten very involved to around the issues of people that are available to supply their workforce. So, and, you know, the overwhelming number of people incarcerated in this, in this society are incarcerated in state and local institutions as well so, even if the, the priorities that otherwise exist, sort of get in a way of federal changes in the short term anyway, we can look to more changes to state level, and a lot of resources put into that as well. So I'll end with that and I'm glad to entertain any questions that you all have but that's that's my like 33 minute course on criminal justice reform and there's a much longer one that I teach. Thank you Stephanie, glad to take any questions. Thank you so much Mr. Johnson for sharing your thoughts on lobbying and mass incarceration, and for linking mass incarceration to the historical context of slavery race neutral laws and policies that you mentioned, as well as providing us with resources on Michelle Alexander's and john James Foreman's analysis of incarceration. So at this time, I'd like to for the remainder of the session I'd like to open it up for you. And as a reminder, participants are invited to make use of the chat box, or the raise hand feature, recognize so that you can pose questions directly to Mr Johnson. I think there's a question hand raised air it looks like Ben Levine hands raised. Oh, yes. Thanks. Am I going to just come off mute and speak. Yes. Great. Hello Professor Johnson. Hey Ben, you too. I'd love to just learn a little bit more here about like efforts or strategies and the legal side to about conditions with conditions inside prisons. There's need kind of mentioned movements, coalitions efforts to limit mass incarceration or the return of of incarcerated people but what about what's happening inside of jails and prisons is that also being addressed. Yeah, it certainly has been addressed in some of the legislation been at the federal level but especially at the state level, there have been a number of number of efforts to address conditions inside of prisons. It's very tough, though, to make reforms there because sort of the jethers kind of a general view that you have to break through which is that you know people who are incarcerated shouldn't feel that the conditions under which they're are comfortable. In a sense and that that that you know it's a short sighted view right I mean conditions in prisons should be such that they help lead people people toward rehabilitation and successful rehabilitation which would involve say workforce training. For example, so some certainly many jurisdictions I would say that are forward looking address those kinds of reforms but again they're somewhat atypical and many other places as well you just don't hear a lot of people, sort of talking about those situations. Thanks. Sure. Mr Johnson, there's a question in the chat box that I'll read. So this question is from Julie. So what would your top priority for changing federal policy to reduce incarceration levels will be your top priority. And can you discuss any promising policies that could be persuaded to reduce recidivism beyond workforce training. Yeah, and I think those two are associated questions. Because, you know, a major reason that we have the system of mass incarceration is because of the pernicious nature of the way we we fail to give people opportunities and what they need when they get released sort of this notion I mentioned of lasting right that you, you know that you get out of a prison and in many jurisdictions you you if you were in for felony which certainly the case with most people that you can't vote. Yeah, or you can't get public housing. And until very recently you couldn't get access to a Pell Grant, you could perhaps get a GED but you couldn't get a Pell Grant to allow you to pursue higher education. And then, you know, issues of course around employment that have led to, you know, many jurisdictions efforts to ban the box or among many employers to ban the box as well. So I think that so I guess I would answer that question that it's really important to look at the back end. Like what happens to people after they are released from these from institutions important to have training workforce training and other opportunities from people when they're in but for people to have support systems and to take away the barriers that not just hypnotize them when they get released for the long haul but also they get in the way of them again being able to take care of themselves economically be able to house themselves and their families and in healthy environments healthy from both a physical and emotional standpoint. And then also to be rehabilitated to the point where they can vote and have an impact on what's happening in public policy in their communities so I think a lot of it really is again that back end set of issues. We need to prevent as much as we can people being incarcerated in the first place but let's stop this. This cycle of riveted recidivism in this country which feeds this, these numbers so terribly Stephanie can I go through a question to this group here this is Ben knows this I'll treat this like this is in the classroom. Absolutely. Are people hopeful about the possibility of criminal justice reform being further along. For example in your state. Imagine that most of you even on the zoom caller and state of Michigan. The people are politicians talking about it there and are things happening at the legislative level in the state of Michigan. Hey Cindy. Hey, so I think, I think it's sort of a mixed bag, as far as feeling hopeful. I think we've got, especially at the local level, certain things happening like our local. I think that who is, you know, getting rid of cash bail. And, you know, we're starting to see some things I think, I mean, I think at the national level having the administration as you were talking about before. You know, I mean, certainly, we've got better chances now although there was some success last during the last administration which I'm really glad you touched on that piece too. I think it's about the lobbying effort, and maybe even address more, if you could address even more on not only the state level because so many of our issues by state sort of advocacy policies I mean you look at the right to life folks who have been going through this, but we're seeing it in voter suppression. And I'm sure for criminal justice that this also is starting at the local and state level and hopefully moving up to the federal, as well as not always realizing what the perfection is but realizing that you need to take the steps to get there. Right. What's interesting when you think about lobbying tactics Cindy around something like this right because I mean one of the I think the important successful tactics in any kind of a campaign where you've got people who are working on and successfully made the reforms happen, or whenever the issue at the state level, or who committed to change on the state level is to have them, you know, sort of intercede to lobby at the federal level. So if you're going to move a lawmaker federal lawmaker from the state of Michigan on an issue like mass incarceration. It certainly does help. If that lawmaker and his or her staff is being approached as being lobbied by people from the local level who can say, as a result of these measures, right that we put in place at the state level. We've seen these kinds of reductions in prison populations in jail populations and arrests in our jurisdiction. That that is that had a big role to play certainly and what happened in 2017 2018 and moving, you know lawmakers from pretty conservative states and districts to a point where they would also support criminal justice reform. And the tremendous reforms made in the state of Texas, for example, and you know Texas has been moving more toward perhaps being a purple state sort of. But still pretty conservative state, and yet we saw we certainly saw Texas lawmakers, you know, in federal Texas lawmaker supporting criminal justice reform. We saw Georgia as well where Congressman Collins former Congressman Collins worked with Congressman Jeffrey from New York on the first step back as major champions. A lot of that I'm sure was driven by what was happening in Georgia that impressed him. Thank you. Sure. So Wendy Hawkins has her hand up, and she has a question for you Mr Johnson. Hi, I was actually going to answer. Sorry, that's my dog barking answer a question about hope in the state of Michigan around criminal justice reform. Sure. So I think what I struggle with a lot as someone who's interested in criminal justice reform and abolition really is that like ending cash bail is really great for people moving forward but what I want to know is, how do we go back and help the people that are still being harmed and incarcerated and so something that I find myself to be a hopeful person but something that's hard for me in the state of Michigan is the truth and sentencing laws and how people are forced to serve just indeterminately long sentences and I wonder if you know any sort of legislative actions or if you find hope in like letting people out after 25 or 30 years because there's so much hope in reducing jail populations or an ending cash bail but then there's still all these people that have been suffering for so long that are often left out of like legislation and moves towards justice. Sure. So yes, there are many efforts in the states on on you know the addressing these indeterminate sentences or these sentences that are so excessive that people just will languish in jail for 3040 years. And then we'll recall this incredible film that actually showed last semester and I would encourage all of you. It's available and I think it's still available in Amazon Prime. But it's a film called simply time. And that's the title of the film. And it's a documentary. And it chronicles the 20 year effort by by family husband and wife husband incarcerated 45 year sentence for an armed robbery that that the two of them committed when they were in their early 20s. She served three years in prison. She was pregnant when she went into prison. But he's he had a 45 year sentence and it looked like he was going to serve all of that sentence. But she got very involved in efforts to get clemency for him. And I won't. I guess I shouldn't say how the documentary ends. Because when I watched the documentary actually for the first time I expected a very different ending. I didn't really know how it would end. I thought that there'd be some really, because they raised six children by the way I can tell you that too. They raised six sons, while he was in prison, all this time. And several of those sons have now gone on to professional careers ones a dentist and other ones a lawyer. It's really quite a story. But the most important thing when you to go to your question is that that they have gotten involved in efforts to address these indeterminate and excessively long sentences in the state of Louisiana to at least get clemency for many people. But that's an example of what what has been happening and there's certainly been legislative efforts and there's also the first step back, people got released from prisons we weren't going to get released anytime before their sentences were over. So you're right though to pinpoint that there are so many people who spend so much time up to the end of their sentences and their lives are over once they end up in prison. And we can so reduce the population by it. But again, without the support on the other side of when people get released. They'll end up, they'll end up in many cases anyway, back in prison again, or in many cases homeless just languishing in our society and that's obviously deeply tragic. I think I see a hand raised there. Hi. I'm not john know. No, yeah, I'm sure. What is your name, Marcia. Hi, Marcia. Hi. You asked about hope. And I work out at the women's prison here in Michigan with pregnant women in prison. And we just the state just decided not to shackle women to their labor and delivery bed a year ago. And you know that's a long way from hope to have just that they don't have. They can have a support person, but only one. A lot of things that make it difficult, and then they have to be returned to prison within 24 hours. And not with their baby after they give birth, after they give birth. They have 24 hours or if the mother has had some sort of birthing problem like if she had a C section, she gets to stay an extra day. And so it poses enormous hardships. Well first of all on the mother who therefore cannot nurse her baby or see that child until God knows when. But sometimes the families live, you know, they might live in the UP, and the state doesn't notify them that the woman has gone into labor so somebody can begin to make the drive down. So that child is either in the hospital or goes to foster care until somebody can pick it up. I mean, it's just, it's a very dysfunctional, unhopeful situation. The reason I bring it up is largely that the organizations who do this kind of work, find that if they challenge the system in any way, they can be disinvited to the prison. And Massachusetts did that fairly recently. Did what stopped. Stop the program of heavy. So what this is, is it their doulas who go in. So, women who are trained to be a supportive person in birth and this is just because nobody else was allowed to go in with these women. And so I guess something happened in Massachusetts where the organization challenged the prison system in such a way that they said, that's okay we don't need you in here then. I think that's a, that's maybe a hesitation that a lot of well intentioned nonprofits, working with prisoners have. There's a sure rules as I'm sure you know, when you enter a prison. Yeah, no question you know this issue about shackling pregnant women were incarcerated was, was part of the first step back at the federal level and prohibiting that practice anymore at least at the federal level. So is barbaric anyway. Yeah, you know it's, it's great when you see progress, but let's not, you know, dilute ourselves that we've got barbaric things that we have to, that just shouldn't be have to be subject to a change in the law that morality should keep us from every doing in the first place and progress to progress and I think that just goes back to sort of, I'm sorry go ahead. No, I would just nodding my head in agreement. And you know this is something a bit and then can attest to this this is, you know, as I started off with saying that there's the, there's this, you know this bright line. And it seems between whether you know we need to take a wholesale approach, or whether continuing to make incremental change is good. And, you know, or enough, because you know better is good, as my old boss used to say. And yet is that always the case. If you've got something that is so fundamentally kind of rotten at the core. You know, close to Michelle Alexander's, you know, approach to this, you know, making incremental change perhaps it makes some people feel better and some people in the margins do better. And some lives are changed these aren't all just about statistics. And yet does it keep us from being able to do something more significant because of all the political capital that is exercised in trying to make incremental change. And in fact, done was not a small thing, and yet could we have gone larger. And among the people who argued for a much bolder approach was, you know, Eric Holder. And if you read James Foreman's book, Eric is pretty, is pretty critical of what Eric Holder did when he was US attorney in DC. Thank you. Of course. Thank you everyone we are over time thanks for for attending today's session for posing questions to Mr Johnson on the importance of lobbying and mass incarceration so we can see that there is a lot of tensions between the beneficiaries of who benefits from a system like that and the far reaching consequences of families and their lives so this concludes our events thank you so much for joining us and stay tuned 2021 2022 public policy and institutional discrimination discussion series. Thank you. Oh blue.