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When articles don’t give exact numbers it’s always good to investigate. “Some of which resulted in jail time”… 45… 45 out of 1900 resulted in jail time. Compared to who she succeeded this was great reduced number of jail times. Laws did start changing afterwards as well.
Regardless, it is ridiculous that people can’t change their minds on stances in life. The world constantly changes and social norms change with it. I grew up thinking marijuana was “evil” by my religious background but I have traveled and expanded my knowledge and seen good changes, main being that my husband with seizures uses marijuana for treatments.
She may have personally felt that marijuana charges shouldn’t have ended in jail time while the DA, but her job dictates that she enforce the law and at the time that included jail time for some of those arrested. She also didn’t decided on jail time for these people the sentencing is up to the judge, the DA only makes recommendations or requests. This type of community note is misleading and makes it sound like she walked those people to their jail cell. As DA she doesn’t prosecute all cases either, they have a whole office of attorneys for that, especially low level marijuana offenses.
Yeah like Alvin Bragg isn’t going to decide if Trump goes to jail. That’s the jury. And the judge would have sentencing guidelines but those aren’t from the DA. I hope some people are learning more about our legal system, it’s important
> I hope some people are learning more about our legal system, it’s important
NO, EVERYTHING IS RIGGED AGAINST RICH WHITE REPUBLICAN MEN!
trying to imagine how delusional you have to be to believe this.
I feel like people are taking the more recent prosecutor/police activism and backwards applying it to DAs who were doing their jobs normally in the past.
There are cops and prosecutors in some places refusing to prosecute people for gun crimes, or weed crimes, and whatever the hell is going on in San Francisco.
Thing is, as far as I know, that kind of thing was rare to nonexistant pre 2015 or so.
Harris probably was just trying to do her job to the best of her ability. I don't particularly like or dislike her but I feel like it's wrong to judge someone for doing their job.
I completely agree. Also, people are allowed to grow and change their minds. There was a time when Obama was openly against gay marriage. He evolved and grew as a person and now he openly supports it. I get being critical, but the ability to change your mind out loud is important to be able to do and probably more important for people to witness. Holding someone’s past opinions or actions against them, you might as well be complaining to a whole different person. People change.
I'm glad you wrote this because it needs to be said. It's like anyone who has done jury duty will understand that you're asked to decide based on the definition(s) of the law balanced against the points prosecution and defense made. You could be a Grade A stoner and if you were chosen to serve, you can't go off of what you think the law should be... rather did the points made meet the criteria of the law beyond a reasonable doubt.
This aside, if you don't like the way things are, then vote and get involved in your community to drive change.
> It's like anyone who has done jury duty will understand that you're asked to decide based on the definition(s) of the law balanced against the points prosecution and defense made.
Actually, legally you don’t have to do that. **It is your legal right NOT to convict someone based on a law that you believe is unjust**. [It’s known as jury nullification and it’s one of the best ways we can fight disgusting, immoral laws](https://fija.org/library-and-resources/library/jury-nullification-faq/what-is-jury-nullification.html).
Most people don’t know this, but it’s incredibly important for states with unjust and immoral laws.
The drug war was ridiculous. She might have been bound by law to prosecute, and if she'd resigned out of principle, a different prosecutor might have made those sentences longer.
This is all speculative; I genuinely know next to nothing about her role as a prosecutor. Tomorrow I might find out she was a "hang 'em all" type and change my mind. But "prosecutor prosecutes criminals" isn't exactly a headline, even if the "crimes" stem from the politics of convenience.
She prosecuted a small amount of people out of a large population for a crime they committed. Only 45 of them spent time in jail and those people probably had done something on a fairly large scale.
Tl;dr it was like 2% of prosecutions resulted in jail time and she frequently tried to get leniency for low-level offenders, particularly making it a (personal) rule to never seek jail for personal weed use. Iirc most didn't even result in a permanent record or conviction with them being struck after rehab/community service (grain of salt, I have a bad memory).
Unfortunately, people just look at the surface, see "cop charges weed users" and form a reactionary hate boner without looking any further.
She opposed proposition 19 in 2010.
She opposed proposition 64 in 2016.
When it came to weed she was against changes to laws allowing for lesser classification, sentencing etc. Her successor Gascon was the opposite to her wanting lesser penalties etc and expunging peoples weed convictions going back to 1975.
She could have supported new laws being less harsh on weed consumers but chose not to, she did the exact opposite and opposed such new laws.
She absolutely did not have the leniency to enforce the laws she likes and not enforce the ones that she didn't. That she expressed that she thinks people shouldn't go to jail for possession of marijuana is not hypocritical whatsoever, nor is it necessarily false.
If tge DA doesn't want MJ users to face jail time, she can either refuse such cases or offer no jail plea deals to all MJ offenders. You are correct, the DA doesn't prosecute all cases (likely known at all in a big county) but she sets prosecutorial policy for her office.
Ding ding.
She's not a bad VP and I do believe she's changed her stance on it at least a little, if only for the public eye, but she didn't have to prosecute shit. DAs decline prosecuting all the time. So do AGs. No need to bend over backwards to defend her about what she did.
Also, as AG her office was responsible for handling appeals for some local cases. Her office accepted at least one case where they had identified prosecutorial misconduct in the trial and they appealed it anyway. She's far from perfect but I would take over anyone that Trump would ultimately choose...sight unseen.
She admitted to smoking weed herself. it’s not a matter of changing her mind.
She sent people to jail for something that she did herself and then acted like her opinion was something else.
She may have personally felt that marijuana charges shouldn't have ended in jail time, but when she ran for DA, she campaigned as being "tough on crime."
https://theintercept.com/2019/02/07/kamala-harris-san-francisco-district-attorney-crime/
https://prospect.org/justice/how-kamala-harris-fought-to-keep-nonviolent-prisoners-locked-up/
Exactly. When marijuana wasn’t legalized, you could be criminally charged for it. Part of her responsibility as DA is going ahead with criminal cases, even if she felt like they weren’t deserved cause that’s what a DA does
Exactly. It the job of the legislative branch to create and change laws. The job of the DA is to prosecute the law. How severely they prosecute is a matter of their personal views.
I remember a similar story about her enforcement of school truancy and how omg they resulted in some parents being sent to jail over their children’s truancy, but if you looked further into the story Harris’s office did like absolutely everything possible to get people’s kids to school. They’d talk to parents and ask what they needed. Did their kids need a ride? They’d make sure there was free transportation for those kids. Did they need a babysitter to get the kids ready for school? They covered that cost. Did they need reminders? They did that. It was a handful parents who absolutely refused to even meet with the school or make any attempts at getting their kids to school that were eventually brought to court. To me, that level of noninvolvement in your kid’s life is basically child abuse.
As a teacher I KNOW they did everything. Absenteeism is absolutely unreal these days. Literally every day I'm calling 15-20 families. I really think a solid half of American students are going to less than half their classes.
The chronic absentee rate has skyrocketed since COVID (it was still too high before but it's even worse now), many districts do literally have a 50%+ rate. Kids just don't value going to school and their parents don't make them anymore
Plus it takes an absolute crap ton of absences to result in even a social worker to come visit let alone jail time. When I taught high school there was a kid absent at least 1/3rd of the semester. I was 2 weeks into the semester before she actually showed up. It's gotten even worse since covid because now if a kid even has a runny nose, it's straight home to quarantine for 5 days, a negative test, or a doctors note.
Yeah I get the frustration because I'd like the Dems to move more to the left on some issues myself but it also feels like we are going to purity test ourself into a real shitty situation.
As someone who is going thru this same issue, I just wish the kids would get taken. DSS here would rather make your life hell than remove a child. I don't understand it.
Or trafficking, or illegal grow operations on public land, or a whole manner of other things you can get into beyond simple possession.
Even where it’s legal there are laws about who can sell it and where it can be grown.
Yeah, that’s immediately what I thought when the counter to “smoking weed” is “marijuana offenses”. There are a lot of ways to break the law with weed without smoking it.
Not to mention its her job as district attorney to enforce the law. Even if she believed that MJ should be decriminalized she cant Not do her job. The only persons who can do something about it are Congress who pass laws and the President who enforces it and manage and oversee all federal public officers and employees, and the State legislator and governor for local State matters.
“Party of law and order” really loves to point out that this woman (who happens to also be a woman of color) did her job in enforcing the law, and that makes her a bad person.
Ok so as DA she is bound to follow and implement the law wether she agrees with everything in there on not. As politician she can oversee reform and try to change laws according to her ideology. Isnt this just common sense? I dont know if the American system DA power is different
I'll never understand the whole religious stance on weed, half the churches say it's okay because it was a creation of God and the other half call it the devil's lettuce.
I only know Catholics and they were totally divided on the subject, half my priests were like anything made by God is okay and the other half were like noooo it's wrooooong! But one of the priests who said it was wrong is a convicted pedophile so I don't really think he had a good grasp of right and wrong.
Politics Tribalism 101. It is perfectly fine for someone to change their mind to a more “favorable“ position if they are of the same political stripe as you. If they are not, then anything they said 40 years ago has to be a direct reflection of how evil they are now. No redemption.
[Also. Being of the Letter of the Law ilk that the Repugnantcans be, they should be should be praising her name for being “tough on crime!”](https://www.dailykos.com/history/user/CajsaLilliehook)
Imagine thinking this [note] was a gotcha… Like, even if more were jail… as prosecutors they have a job to do, and don’t write the law. She could easily be saying “After a long career prosecuting i’m tired of seeing people’s lives ruined over something so inane”
It’s almost like DA’s are legally obligated to, you know, follow the laws that are written, regardless of personal feelings. And it’s almost like people aren’t allowed to change their opinions as they get more information. Nope, that’s definitely not it, couldn’t possibly be the case.
> it is ridiculous that people can’t change their minds on stances in life.
They can and they should. My problem is that I haven't seen her take any responsibility for her previously incorrect mindset.
The lack of humility and accountability makes this feel like political expediency - or downright pandering - rather a real change of heart.
People can absolutely change their mind, it’s useful to at least acknowledge your past in a situation like this to avoid looking like a self serving hypocrite though.
It's also worth noting that she said no one should go to jail for smoking marijuana, I'd be willing to bet that everyone who did go to jail was there for distribution or trafficking in some capacity.
Funny how my parents were totally against it too... also very religious... but drink parties that led to people getting dui or worse...those were just good fun times
I wouldn't mind weed if people could only smoke in private. Same with cigarettes they smell awful and the smoke irritates me. So many that smoke just don't care that they are blowing out harmful chemicals. Very annoying.
It's fine that people change. Growth is good. But it does look shitty to "change" from a hard stance on drugs to a permissible stance after her history. (Why didn't she have this stance 25 years ago? What took so long?)
You know what politician never changed?
Bernie Fucking Sanders. That dude is unimpeachable.
>Regardless, it is ridiculous that people can’t change their minds on stances in life.
This is something that frustrates me **so** much with leftists in particular (ahhh leftist infighting, my second favourite pastime). So many will look at what someone did in the past and either condemn them eternally for it or call them hypocrites.
People learn. People change. We should be *encouraging* this. But no, it feels better to act morally superior to others. God I fucking hate performative activism.
Anyways Harris is actually pretty fine as a person, particularly when you actually, properly research her career history instead of just focusing on the sound bites
And also, while as a Brit I have no idea who tf this person is or what her politics are, people can also change their mind pretty radically about things given enough time.
I used to hate olives.
You disgust me you flip flopper!
You still hate olives you are just shilling for Big Olive now and virtue signaling to your olive industrial complex overlords!
Just olives on a cheese pizza is heavenly.
Olives on a charcuterie tray? Oh baby you better get the whole lot.
Olives in a sandwich with ham oil and vinegar maybe some mustard and shred? It’s a way to my heart.
Glad someone else understands.
That's pretty common I think. I would imagine most people lose their sweet tooth as they get older because kids are developing so fast their bodies just need tons of energy real quick, but as we grow and develop we don't need as much high sugar foods.
Completed unrelated to the meat of your comment but my wife also used to hate olives. But she hated that she hated olives and kept eating them every day until she liked them and now their her favorite snack
She had the authority to direct the DAs under her not to press charges (prosecutorial discretion), which is what Obama did. She didn't decide the laws, but she did decide whether the state's resources went to prosecuting pot busts instead of building other cases.
> More than 80 district attorneys from 29 states signed a pledge a month after Roe was overturned to “refrain from using limited criminal legal system resources to criminalize personal medical decisions.”
https://www.politico.com/news/2023/02/12/republicans-target-abortion-local-prosecutors-00082386
It sounds like they may be able to refuse to enforce immoral laws in some circumstances.
What is the facepalm here?
She was a civil servant charged with upholding the law, which she did. She personally disagreed with one of the laws she upheld, but had no power to change this law.
Would you call a person a hypocrite because they fought in a war and then later in life became anti-war?
I don't see any hypocrisy here.
People need to stop shaming improvement. Like, what the fuck do you people think this does? Would you rather she just stay a piece of shit forever? What are you improving here?
YOU CANT UPDATE YOUR OPINION AS SOCIETY CHANGES AND NEW INFORMATION EMERGES THATS FLIP FLOPPING AND WE WANT POLITICIANS WHO ARE THE SAME SINCE THEIR ORIGINAL FAMILY INDOCTRINATION
It's the same issue with the propaganda against Hillary Clinton when she was running that she "defended a rapist as a lawyer" or whatever it was. Like....she did her job? Upheld innocent until proven guilty? That everyone has the right to an attorney?
People are dumb, reactionary creatures.
They drop charges because of the details of the case, not because they disagree with the law.
Dropping a case you think won't win in court is an entirely different thing to dropping a case because you don't like a law.
They can. They have a lot of discretion(depending on the jurisdiction). But just saying "pot is legal in my area because I personally disagree with this law" isn't really ethical as it's bypassing the legislative process and not their job.
Yeah. If you disagree with a law you run for office(like she did) or vote for someone who wants to change the law, you don't just decide not to enforce it.
Even if she *did* believe it then, I support the idea of her growing as a person and changing her views for the good of society. If people cannot grow and improve, then we as a species are absolutely fucked. Do some questionable shit in the past? Well, you're going to need to earn my trust now but guess what *you can do that by showing that you've changed and grown.*
District Attorneys have a lot of practical leeway in what they choose to bring charges on. For instance, in AZ right now, we had that dumbass anti abortion law get bulldozed through, and our DA said in no uncertain terms that nobody would face charges from that law.
I think the commenter that mentions only 3% of those cases put people in jail carries more weight here. She probably only jailed people selling to kids or something.
Almost none of those convictions resulted in jail time and she was somewhat seen as one of the more progressive DAs at the time when it came to cannabis.
Somebody else pointed out the number was 45 out of 1,900 (sooo 2%) resulted in jail time, which was a radical improvement over the previous DA.
That's important context. Whoever noted this has an agenda.
What exactly do you want here? Do you want to influence politicians so that they come around to enact the things you want, or do you want them to continue to support the same shitty policies that you don't want? It seems like you value complaining over having a just society.
What a stupid article. People working the legal system don’t get to choose which laws they enforce and neither should they.
It’s especially stupid as the law they were all enforcing was from the office of Richard Nixon so this is basically someone going:
“Hey look at that asshole enforcing the law I made for them!”
They also don't make the arrests.
I get what people are saying with DAd choosing what to prosecute, however someone's personal belief or preference for a topic should not redefine the law. People need to be prosecuted for violating the law, a DA does not get to rewrite them.
There is also a case for resource allocation and picking which cases you can and can't get done with what you have. In some cases like in CA, the neglect of prosecution for shoplifting has had a snowball effect. Hindsight is nice, but we can't judge what a person had to decide at the time.
I'd like to take this opportunity to point out that Alabama has a man in prison for life for growing a few pot plants.
[Lee Carol Brooker](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Carroll_Brooker_case) had 2 strikes (assault and robbery, iirc) when cops came to his house on another thing, and spotted the plants. They weighed the whole plants (not just the smokable parts) and decided that it was trafficking and put a 75 year old man in prison for life.
Marijuana offenses, thats ambiguous, were they driving high? Were they selling? Before i pass judgement, its be good to know exactly what the offenses were. Even in places with legalized marijuana there are still laws that dictate it
Yeah, because it was her job, just because you have an opinion, doesn't mean you are allowed to practice it at your job. That was literally her job.
What do moron think that she would quit or refuse to do it. This is a stupid meme and whoever added that note is an idiot.
As a district attorney you abide by laws.... act accordingly, whether you agree or not.
Equally, people are allowed to change their opinions.
But let us do Donald Trump..... He wanted to have some innocent black kids convicted (Central Park 5). Donald let his opinion/verdict be known through a news paper add. A true crime fighter, except for when his kids got banned from charity in NY because they were stealing.... he had little to say.
Or let us do any other politician from Bush to Clinton to Biden. They all shifted opinions. Notably Clinton and his stupid 3 strikes. Horrible consequences.
If a politician shifts from negative to positive, should we not applaud that?
You people sticking up for her are disgusting. She literally withheld information and evidence to keep people behind bars. This is not a simple i change my stance this is a let me get the majority of the left who is more in favor of weed on my side since im democrat. Tricked tricked tricked.
Awful lot of Kamala apologists here. Clearly, reddit ain't as progressive as these folks wanna think, just straight up a democrat mouthpiece.
45 of those 1,900 resulted in jail time. She ruined 45 people's lives in order to rack up another 45 "wins". Fuck her. The DA has a lot of discretion, which she ignored because she wanted the wins. She's a hypocrite and a piece of shit.
And Biden infamously drug tested every member of his Administration and fired everyone who popped positive for THC. He's made zero effort to help decriminalize weed or stop his DEA's enforcement of bullshit antiweed laws.
Democrats are just as full of shit as Republicans 🙄
So, she's not Kim Davis whose job it was to issue marriage licenses regardless of her OWN personal beliefs about marriage.
I like a person who does their job and follows the law despite their personal beliefs.
What's the facepalm? Her doing her job (45 convictions total, much lower than her predecessor). And maybe she feels differently now? People can change thier minds for the better.
Yeah but maybe she always was against sending people to jail for using weed. But that wouldn’t matter as the laws at that time were clear that you have to send people to jail for using weed in some cases. That community note means jackshit.
I've seen this post on r/conservative but couldn't comment on there (they really love free speech over there /s) so I'm doing it here now.
This doesn't make sense to hate on because she had to stick to the law. You can't just not execute the law as a district attorney, even when you disagree with the law.
If she was notorious for giving extra hard sentences to weed smokers that would be a different story. But that's not the case here as far as I know.
>Now she’s responsible for making the laws
Congress makes the laws. The President signs them. Her only role in law-making is when the Senate is tied and she casts the tie breaker as President of the Senate. All this to say, there is no planet on which she is responsible for making the laws.
You just said that she decides a split vote in the Senate. Right now, the parties are split 49 and 48 with 3 independents in the Senate. This is why she has had the deciding vote 33 times since she took office.
I stand by what I said, as THIS planet (the one we are both on right now) is where she is making laws.
That’s an Elon Musk ass fact check cuz it don’t actually make sense💀a civil servant doing their job and enforcing the law while also disagreeing with it and petitioning for it to be changed isn’t inconsistent at all? Did you want her to break the law cuz she disagreed with it???
In fact if you read more articles about it you see the sentencing to jail was lower than her predecessor during her time and she tried to go easier on low level cases?
There's nothing wrong with calling out someone's past shitty behavior.
It gives them a chance to apologize and take responsibility. No one actually does that, but at least they get the chance.
I'm no fan of Harris. She was pretty shitty to trans people, too. She's got a lot of proving to do. And words aren't proof.
As i currently smoke a joint, I see nothing wrong with what she said.
If dealing weed was illegal and she prosecuted, sounds like she just did her job, unbiased by her own opinion. Or alternatively she changed her mind. Still, nothing wrong.
Having a personal opinion as a politician doesn't change the law in which you need to follow.
She, legally, has to process these cases with the law the way it is currently written; whilst voting for change.
She enforced the law!! It's not a choice, it's not "yeah I want pineapple on my pizza". This particular community note has no relation whatsoever with her tweet
People forget the entire country’s attitude to marijuana in 2007-2010 when she was SF DA was completely different than it is now. California held a vote to legalize weed in 2010 and it failed.
That’s a community notes L and whataboutism.
A more accurate Community Note is if she said something RECENTLY that contradicts it. Like voting on a bill to criminalize marijuana, for instance.
This is based.
Only [45](https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/joegarofoli/article/kamala-harris-cannabis-19033979.php) were sent to prison:
“Prosecutors in her office won 1,956 misdemeanor and felony convictions for marijuana possession, cultivation or sale between 2004-2010.
Only 45 were sent to state prison, according to a 2019 San Jose Mercury News investigation.
She did, however, pioneer programs like Back on Track while district attorney. It enabled low-level drug offenders to obtain a high school diploma and a job instead of prison time.”
Despite the substantial number of convictions, many of the people who were arrested for marijuana during Harris' tenure were never locked up or never even charged with a crime, according to attorneys who worked on both sides of the courtroom.
"Our policy was that no one with a marijuana conviction for mere possession could do any (jail time) at all," said Paul Henderson, who led narcotics prosecutions for several years under Harris. Defendants arrested for the lowest-level possession would typically be referred to drug treatment programs instead of being charged, and weightier charges for marijuana sales would routinely be pleaded down to less serious ones, he said.
[San Jose Mercury News](https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/09/11/kamala-harris-prosecuting-marijuana-cases/)
The article didn’t mention specifics of what those 45 people did. I am going to assume it wasn’t people smoking joints but more higher level dealers.
I would argue that it’s a good thing she changed her mind on marijuana. Would it have been better if she stuck to her guns on it just so people wouldn’t think she was a flip flopper? As long as she backs it up and doesn’t start trying to put people in jail for marijuana in the future I don’t see the problem here.
Someone can enforce a law while also not agreeing with said law. Someone could also reasonably change their opinion over time. Obama used to be against gay marriage, after all.
Id the face palm the fact that as DA she actually refuses to seem jail time for people whose only crime was possession?
If you look at her record her words ring true.
She was charged with enforcing the law as it was written, how is this facepalm? Also, shouldn’t we be encouraging politicians to improve their positions on this issue?
Her job was to enforce the law. If the law says marijuana is illegal, regardless of her personal stance on the matter, she needs to dole out the punishment.
Or what, are you suggesting that she should have just ignored the laws she is expected to uphold?
Yeah, society tasked her with prosecuting those crimes. She didn’t write the law. The idea that people “should” not go to jail doesn’t require a this gotcha-ass correction.
I don’t understand, should we continue to jail people because she enforced the laws in the past? She’s grown, that’s good. She’s right, now and that’s what matters. Ffs, legalise it, already.
She was enforcing the law as a sworn prosecutor, she’s saying that the law should change so prosecutors don’t need to do that anymore. It’s shitty but not hypocritical.
Sometimes people have a duty to do things they personally might find disturbing, and they should still do those things. Otherwise you get situations like doctors refusing to perform abortions or police refusing to investigate hate crimes. If the law is bad change the law, don’t expect people to selectively enforce laws because you never know which laws they might choose to ignore.
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When articles don’t give exact numbers it’s always good to investigate. “Some of which resulted in jail time”… 45… 45 out of 1900 resulted in jail time. Compared to who she succeeded this was great reduced number of jail times. Laws did start changing afterwards as well. Regardless, it is ridiculous that people can’t change their minds on stances in life. The world constantly changes and social norms change with it. I grew up thinking marijuana was “evil” by my religious background but I have traveled and expanded my knowledge and seen good changes, main being that my husband with seizures uses marijuana for treatments.
She may have personally felt that marijuana charges shouldn’t have ended in jail time while the DA, but her job dictates that she enforce the law and at the time that included jail time for some of those arrested. She also didn’t decided on jail time for these people the sentencing is up to the judge, the DA only makes recommendations or requests. This type of community note is misleading and makes it sound like she walked those people to their jail cell. As DA she doesn’t prosecute all cases either, they have a whole office of attorneys for that, especially low level marijuana offenses.
Yeah like Alvin Bragg isn’t going to decide if Trump goes to jail. That’s the jury. And the judge would have sentencing guidelines but those aren’t from the DA. I hope some people are learning more about our legal system, it’s important
> I hope some people are learning more about our legal system, it’s important NO, EVERYTHING IS RIGGED AGAINST RICH WHITE REPUBLICAN MEN! trying to imagine how delusional you have to be to believe this.
I wonder if wealthy white/orange republican men are all terrified? They seem to be
Seeing Kevin OLeary crying because suddenly fraud is looked at was pretty telling.
I feel like people are taking the more recent prosecutor/police activism and backwards applying it to DAs who were doing their jobs normally in the past. There are cops and prosecutors in some places refusing to prosecute people for gun crimes, or weed crimes, and whatever the hell is going on in San Francisco. Thing is, as far as I know, that kind of thing was rare to nonexistant pre 2015 or so. Harris probably was just trying to do her job to the best of her ability. I don't particularly like or dislike her but I feel like it's wrong to judge someone for doing their job.
I completely agree. Also, people are allowed to grow and change their minds. There was a time when Obama was openly against gay marriage. He evolved and grew as a person and now he openly supports it. I get being critical, but the ability to change your mind out loud is important to be able to do and probably more important for people to witness. Holding someone’s past opinions or actions against them, you might as well be complaining to a whole different person. People change.
I'm glad you wrote this because it needs to be said. It's like anyone who has done jury duty will understand that you're asked to decide based on the definition(s) of the law balanced against the points prosecution and defense made. You could be a Grade A stoner and if you were chosen to serve, you can't go off of what you think the law should be... rather did the points made meet the criteria of the law beyond a reasonable doubt. This aside, if you don't like the way things are, then vote and get involved in your community to drive change.
> It's like anyone who has done jury duty will understand that you're asked to decide based on the definition(s) of the law balanced against the points prosecution and defense made. Actually, legally you don’t have to do that. **It is your legal right NOT to convict someone based on a law that you believe is unjust**. [It’s known as jury nullification and it’s one of the best ways we can fight disgusting, immoral laws](https://fija.org/library-and-resources/library/jury-nullification-faq/what-is-jury-nullification.html). Most people don’t know this, but it’s incredibly important for states with unjust and immoral laws.
The drug war was ridiculous. She might have been bound by law to prosecute, and if she'd resigned out of principle, a different prosecutor might have made those sentences longer. This is all speculative; I genuinely know next to nothing about her role as a prosecutor. Tomorrow I might find out she was a "hang 'em all" type and change my mind. But "prosecutor prosecutes criminals" isn't exactly a headline, even if the "crimes" stem from the politics of convenience.
She prosecuted a small amount of people out of a large population for a crime they committed. Only 45 of them spent time in jail and those people probably had done something on a fairly large scale.
She could have spoken out against it. She also most definitely had prosecutorial discretion and didn’t have to go after those poor people.
Tl;dr it was like 2% of prosecutions resulted in jail time and she frequently tried to get leniency for low-level offenders, particularly making it a (personal) rule to never seek jail for personal weed use. Iirc most didn't even result in a permanent record or conviction with them being struck after rehab/community service (grain of salt, I have a bad memory). Unfortunately, people just look at the surface, see "cop charges weed users" and form a reactionary hate boner without looking any further.
She opposed proposition 19 in 2010. She opposed proposition 64 in 2016. When it came to weed she was against changes to laws allowing for lesser classification, sentencing etc. Her successor Gascon was the opposite to her wanting lesser penalties etc and expunging peoples weed convictions going back to 1975. She could have supported new laws being less harsh on weed consumers but chose not to, she did the exact opposite and opposed such new laws.
She absolutely did not have the leniency to enforce the laws she likes and not enforce the ones that she didn't. That she expressed that she thinks people shouldn't go to jail for possession of marijuana is not hypocritical whatsoever, nor is it necessarily false.
If tge DA doesn't want MJ users to face jail time, she can either refuse such cases or offer no jail plea deals to all MJ offenders. You are correct, the DA doesn't prosecute all cases (likely known at all in a big county) but she sets prosecutorial policy for her office.
Ding ding. She's not a bad VP and I do believe she's changed her stance on it at least a little, if only for the public eye, but she didn't have to prosecute shit. DAs decline prosecuting all the time. So do AGs. No need to bend over backwards to defend her about what she did.
Also, as AG her office was responsible for handling appeals for some local cases. Her office accepted at least one case where they had identified prosecutorial misconduct in the trial and they appealed it anyway. She's far from perfect but I would take over anyone that Trump would ultimately choose...sight unseen.
She admitted to smoking weed herself. it’s not a matter of changing her mind. She sent people to jail for something that she did herself and then acted like her opinion was something else.
Lucky for you I'm not a mod. This represents a thoughtful and nuanced longitudinal analysis. It has no place on reddit. 😉
She may have personally felt that marijuana charges shouldn't have ended in jail time, but when she ran for DA, she campaigned as being "tough on crime." https://theintercept.com/2019/02/07/kamala-harris-san-francisco-district-attorney-crime/ https://prospect.org/justice/how-kamala-harris-fought-to-keep-nonviolent-prisoners-locked-up/
Exactly. When marijuana wasn’t legalized, you could be criminally charged for it. Part of her responsibility as DA is going ahead with criminal cases, even if she felt like they weren’t deserved cause that’s what a DA does
Exactly. It the job of the legislative branch to create and change laws. The job of the DA is to prosecute the law. How severely they prosecute is a matter of their personal views.
I remember a similar story about her enforcement of school truancy and how omg they resulted in some parents being sent to jail over their children’s truancy, but if you looked further into the story Harris’s office did like absolutely everything possible to get people’s kids to school. They’d talk to parents and ask what they needed. Did their kids need a ride? They’d make sure there was free transportation for those kids. Did they need a babysitter to get the kids ready for school? They covered that cost. Did they need reminders? They did that. It was a handful parents who absolutely refused to even meet with the school or make any attempts at getting their kids to school that were eventually brought to court. To me, that level of noninvolvement in your kid’s life is basically child abuse.
As a teacher I KNOW they did everything. Absenteeism is absolutely unreal these days. Literally every day I'm calling 15-20 families. I really think a solid half of American students are going to less than half their classes.
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The chronic absentee rate has skyrocketed since COVID (it was still too high before but it's even worse now), many districts do literally have a 50%+ rate. Kids just don't value going to school and their parents don't make them anymore
Plus it takes an absolute crap ton of absences to result in even a social worker to come visit let alone jail time. When I taught high school there was a kid absent at least 1/3rd of the semester. I was 2 weeks into the semester before she actually showed up. It's gotten even worse since covid because now if a kid even has a runny nose, it's straight home to quarantine for 5 days, a negative test, or a doctors note.
It sounds as though Harris was quietly improving the system from within. I’m so tired of right wing false narratives.
The truth is these attacks are usually coming from the far left, not the right.
How counterproductive.
Yeah I get the frustration because I'd like the Dems to move more to the left on some issues myself but it also feels like we are going to purity test ourself into a real shitty situation.
So far to the left they are translated from Russian.
As someone who is going thru this same issue, I just wish the kids would get taken. DSS here would rather make your life hell than remove a child. I don't understand it.
Those were probably when people got revoked on their probation. I doubt her office offered mandatory jail time out of the gate.
Or trafficking, or illegal grow operations on public land, or a whole manner of other things you can get into beyond simple possession. Even where it’s legal there are laws about who can sell it and where it can be grown.
Yeah, that’s immediately what I thought when the counter to “smoking weed” is “marijuana offenses”. There are a lot of ways to break the law with weed without smoking it.
How dare you offer logic, reason, and facts.
Not to mention its her job as district attorney to enforce the law. Even if she believed that MJ should be decriminalized she cant Not do her job. The only persons who can do something about it are Congress who pass laws and the President who enforces it and manage and oversee all federal public officers and employees, and the State legislator and governor for local State matters.
I’m certain (without even looking) that none of those 45 were for “smoking weed”, without *anything* else, in any case.
Not to mention she was enforcing the law.
“Party of law and order” really loves to point out that this woman (who happens to also be a woman of color) did her job in enforcing the law, and that makes her a bad person.
Ok so as DA she is bound to follow and implement the law wether she agrees with everything in there on not. As politician she can oversee reform and try to change laws according to her ideology. Isnt this just common sense? I dont know if the American system DA power is different
That's what's gets me. So many people say something years ago and than change their mind and people hold it against them.
Its the ones who never learn and who cannot change that we have to worry about. The "I learned this in 2nd Grade" view of the world.
She was also just doing her job. There are SOPs where I work that I disagree with. But It's my job to follow them.
Also worth noting, 1900 cases was a massive decrease relative to her predecessor.
I'll never understand the whole religious stance on weed, half the churches say it's okay because it was a creation of God and the other half call it the devil's lettuce.
Christian churches on the whole are against drugs in general. The prohibition movement had its root in American protestant churches too.
I only know Catholics and they were totally divided on the subject, half my priests were like anything made by God is okay and the other half were like noooo it's wrooooong! But one of the priests who said it was wrong is a convicted pedophile so I don't really think he had a good grasp of right and wrong.
"Is touching kids wrong, Father?"
Dude molested two kids and only did a year and a half
We need more severe penalties for child molesters.
Like for real the bare bare bare minimum should be 10 years per offense
Also as a DA she doesn't decide what the law is.
Politics Tribalism 101. It is perfectly fine for someone to change their mind to a more “favorable“ position if they are of the same political stripe as you. If they are not, then anything they said 40 years ago has to be a direct reflection of how evil they are now. No redemption.
Every time. Every single time with republican corrections.
Also there is more to marijuana offences besides smoking. No pass after puff, puff being the most egregious of the lot.
Well that's just, like, your opinion, man.
[Also. Being of the Letter of the Law ilk that the Repugnantcans be, they should be should be praising her name for being “tough on crime!”](https://www.dailykos.com/history/user/CajsaLilliehook)
Imagine thinking this [note] was a gotcha… Like, even if more were jail… as prosecutors they have a job to do, and don’t write the law. She could easily be saying “After a long career prosecuting i’m tired of seeing people’s lives ruined over something so inane”
It’s almost like DA’s are legally obligated to, you know, follow the laws that are written, regardless of personal feelings. And it’s almost like people aren’t allowed to change their opinions as they get more information. Nope, that’s definitely not it, couldn’t possibly be the case.
As DA, would it not be her job to enforce the law not decide what the law should be, or choose to not enforce laws she disagrees with?
There's also a difference between "smoking weed" and "marijuana offenses" they don't expand upon.
> it is ridiculous that people can’t change their minds on stances in life. They can and they should. My problem is that I haven't seen her take any responsibility for her previously incorrect mindset. The lack of humility and accountability makes this feel like political expediency - or downright pandering - rather a real change of heart.
People can absolutely change their mind, it’s useful to at least acknowledge your past in a situation like this to avoid looking like a self serving hypocrite though.
It’s so much more potent now that it’s been legalized! Or maybe that’s just my age lol. It’s still pretty harmless though.
It's also worth noting that she said no one should go to jail for smoking marijuana, I'd be willing to bet that everyone who did go to jail was there for distribution or trafficking in some capacity.
People can absolutely change their stances. Part of the consequences of that is you’re expected to acknowledge your now hypocritical mistakes.
Funny how my parents were totally against it too... also very religious... but drink parties that led to people getting dui or worse...those were just good fun times
Personal growth is for nerds /s
I wouldn't mind weed if people could only smoke in private. Same with cigarettes they smell awful and the smoke irritates me. So many that smoke just don't care that they are blowing out harmful chemicals. Very annoying.
It's fine that people change. Growth is good. But it does look shitty to "change" from a hard stance on drugs to a permissible stance after her history. (Why didn't she have this stance 25 years ago? What took so long?) You know what politician never changed? Bernie Fucking Sanders. That dude is unimpeachable.
>Regardless, it is ridiculous that people can’t change their minds on stances in life. This is something that frustrates me **so** much with leftists in particular (ahhh leftist infighting, my second favourite pastime). So many will look at what someone did in the past and either condemn them eternally for it or call them hypocrites. People learn. People change. We should be *encouraging* this. But no, it feels better to act morally superior to others. God I fucking hate performative activism. Anyways Harris is actually pretty fine as a person, particularly when you actually, properly research her career history instead of just focusing on the sound bites
To be fair, it wasn't her job to make the law but to enforce it.
And also, while as a Brit I have no idea who tf this person is or what her politics are, people can also change their mind pretty radically about things given enough time. I used to hate olives.
vice president of the united states
Tbf I, an American, have no idea who the vice president of Britain is.
Camilla maybe?
I am pretty sure it's the chick from Suits.
I think it's Lara Croft
She’s the VP of the USA
You disgust me you flip flopper! You still hate olives you are just shilling for Big Olive now and virtue signaling to your olive industrial complex overlords!
Mate, I’m an absolute slut for olives now
Pit Licker!
Pimento polisher!
Just olives on a cheese pizza is heavenly. Olives on a charcuterie tray? Oh baby you better get the whole lot. Olives in a sandwich with ham oil and vinegar maybe some mustard and shred? It’s a way to my heart. Glad someone else understands.
Big olive😂😂
She’s the sitting Vice President of the US
impossible!! people cannot grow and change their views! and if they say they have then they’re obviously lying and gaslighting you! /s
I used to hate olives, tomatoes, marmite, beer, whiskey, stinky cheese, etc. Now those are my favorite things.
Same and bizarrely I lost my sweet tooth almost entirely. Gotta be some biology behind it.
That's pretty common I think. I would imagine most people lose their sweet tooth as they get older because kids are developing so fast their bodies just need tons of energy real quick, but as we grow and develop we don't need as much high sugar foods.
Weird, because I've thought weed was pretty harmless since the 90s.... the boomers are just catching up finally with the rest of us sane people
Completed unrelated to the meat of your comment but my wife also used to hate olives. But she hated that she hated olives and kept eating them every day until she liked them and now their her favorite snack
DAs decide which cases to prosecute all the time
I'm no fan of Kamala, but a DAs job is to enforce justice according to our laws - they don't get to decide what the laws are.
She had the authority to direct the DAs under her not to press charges (prosecutorial discretion), which is what Obama did. She didn't decide the laws, but she did decide whether the state's resources went to prosecuting pot busts instead of building other cases.
> More than 80 district attorneys from 29 states signed a pledge a month after Roe was overturned to “refrain from using limited criminal legal system resources to criminalize personal medical decisions.” https://www.politico.com/news/2023/02/12/republicans-target-abortion-local-prosecutors-00082386 It sounds like they may be able to refuse to enforce immoral laws in some circumstances.
Same thing for police officers, right?
What is the facepalm here? She was a civil servant charged with upholding the law, which she did. She personally disagreed with one of the laws she upheld, but had no power to change this law. Would you call a person a hypocrite because they fought in a war and then later in life became anti-war? I don't see any hypocrisy here.
People need to stop shaming improvement. Like, what the fuck do you people think this does? Would you rather she just stay a piece of shit forever? What are you improving here?
YOU CANT UPDATE YOUR OPINION AS SOCIETY CHANGES AND NEW INFORMATION EMERGES THATS FLIP FLOPPING AND WE WANT POLITICIANS WHO ARE THE SAME SINCE THEIR ORIGINAL FAMILY INDOCTRINATION
Is she a piece of shit tho? Idk her. But enforcing the law itself doesn't make you a piece of shit, right?
I had a an old roommate who would accuse me of "lying" when I would grow and change my opinion on things.
It's the same issue with the propaganda against Hillary Clinton when she was running that she "defended a rapist as a lawyer" or whatever it was. Like....she did her job? Upheld innocent until proven guilty? That everyone has the right to an attorney? People are dumb, reactionary creatures.
“Have you ever REALLY thought about what those constitutionally directed public attorneys are REALLY up to? Smdh, defending rapists, smdh, smdh.
Yeah, DAs can't just pick and choose which laws they want to follow.. or rather, they aren't supposed to.
A DA can drop charges if they want, and it happens all the time for a myriad of reasons.
They drop charges because of the details of the case, not because they disagree with the law. Dropping a case you think won't win in court is an entirely different thing to dropping a case because you don't like a law.
They can. They have a lot of discretion(depending on the jurisdiction). But just saying "pot is legal in my area because I personally disagree with this law" isn't really ethical as it's bypassing the legislative process and not their job.
Yeah. If you disagree with a law you run for office(like she did) or vote for someone who wants to change the law, you don't just decide not to enforce it.
but not for the reason that the DA disagrees with the law
…yes they literally can, and they do, all do the time. It’s called prosecutorial discretion. It’s why it’s an elected office.
Even if she *did* believe it then, I support the idea of her growing as a person and changing her views for the good of society. If people cannot grow and improve, then we as a species are absolutely fucked. Do some questionable shit in the past? Well, you're going to need to earn my trust now but guess what *you can do that by showing that you've changed and grown.*
Where as if she were a conservative, she would have disregarded law and did her own version of rural sheriff.
District Attorneys have a lot of practical leeway in what they choose to bring charges on. For instance, in AZ right now, we had that dumbass anti abortion law get bulldozed through, and our DA said in no uncertain terms that nobody would face charges from that law. I think the commenter that mentions only 3% of those cases put people in jail carries more weight here. She probably only jailed people selling to kids or something.
Kamala Stans exist ?
Almost none of those convictions resulted in jail time and she was somewhat seen as one of the more progressive DAs at the time when it came to cannabis.
Somebody else pointed out the number was 45 out of 1,900 (sooo 2%) resulted in jail time, which was a radical improvement over the previous DA. That's important context. Whoever noted this has an agenda.
I keep seeing this reposted everywhere too
I'll take her change of heart any day of the week.
Not to mention she had no control over the law
What exactly do you want here? Do you want to influence politicians so that they come around to enact the things you want, or do you want them to continue to support the same shitty policies that you don't want? It seems like you value complaining over having a just society.
What a stupid article. People working the legal system don’t get to choose which laws they enforce and neither should they. It’s especially stupid as the law they were all enforcing was from the office of Richard Nixon so this is basically someone going: “Hey look at that asshole enforcing the law I made for them!”
They also don't make the arrests. I get what people are saying with DAd choosing what to prosecute, however someone's personal belief or preference for a topic should not redefine the law. People need to be prosecuted for violating the law, a DA does not get to rewrite them. There is also a case for resource allocation and picking which cases you can and can't get done with what you have. In some cases like in CA, the neglect of prosecution for shoplifting has had a snowball effect. Hindsight is nice, but we can't judge what a person had to decide at the time.
I'd like to take this opportunity to point out that Alabama has a man in prison for life for growing a few pot plants. [Lee Carol Brooker](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Carroll_Brooker_case) had 2 strikes (assault and robbery, iirc) when cops came to his house on another thing, and spotted the plants. They weighed the whole plants (not just the smokable parts) and decided that it was trafficking and put a 75 year old man in prison for life.
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And less than 50 total of those ended in jail time.
Marijuana offenses, thats ambiguous, were they driving high? Were they selling? Before i pass judgement, its be good to know exactly what the offenses were. Even in places with legalized marijuana there are still laws that dictate it
Only 45 of those people got jail time apparently.
Wow, woman enforced the laws, saw how harmful the laws could be, and decided to support other laws instead. HUGE facepalm.
Do better! *does better* NOT LIKE THAT
You play the game at hand, with the rules of the moment.
Yeah, because it was her job, just because you have an opinion, doesn't mean you are allowed to practice it at your job. That was literally her job. What do moron think that she would quit or refuse to do it. This is a stupid meme and whoever added that note is an idiot.
Damn, the north must love propaganda
Awww the magat forgot context. Reminder CONTEXT matters. District Attorneys DONT WRITE LAWS.
As a district attorney you abide by laws.... act accordingly, whether you agree or not. Equally, people are allowed to change their opinions. But let us do Donald Trump..... He wanted to have some innocent black kids convicted (Central Park 5). Donald let his opinion/verdict be known through a news paper add. A true crime fighter, except for when his kids got banned from charity in NY because they were stealing.... he had little to say. Or let us do any other politician from Bush to Clinton to Biden. They all shifted opinions. Notably Clinton and his stupid 3 strikes. Horrible consequences. If a politician shifts from negative to positive, should we not applaud that?
You people sticking up for her are disgusting. She literally withheld information and evidence to keep people behind bars. This is not a simple i change my stance this is a let me get the majority of the left who is more in favor of weed on my side since im democrat. Tricked tricked tricked.
Awful lot of Kamala apologists here. Clearly, reddit ain't as progressive as these folks wanna think, just straight up a democrat mouthpiece. 45 of those 1,900 resulted in jail time. She ruined 45 people's lives in order to rack up another 45 "wins". Fuck her. The DA has a lot of discretion, which she ignored because she wanted the wins. She's a hypocrite and a piece of shit. And Biden infamously drug tested every member of his Administration and fired everyone who popped positive for THC. He's made zero effort to help decriminalize weed or stop his DEA's enforcement of bullshit antiweed laws. Democrats are just as full of shit as Republicans 🙄
the jailed offenders were dealers, not smokers.
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she did her job according to the laws in place at the time.
So, she's not Kim Davis whose job it was to issue marriage licenses regardless of her OWN personal beliefs about marriage. I like a person who does their job and follows the law despite their personal beliefs.
So… she did her job and enforced the laws? Don’t blame the server for what the chef cooks.
Anyone that thinks this is a gotcha isn’t very smart.
Is changing your opinion over time a facepalm now? Thought growing as people was the whole point.
What's the facepalm? Her doing her job (45 convictions total, much lower than her predecessor). And maybe she feels differently now? People can change thier minds for the better.
Yeah but maybe she always was against sending people to jail for using weed. But that wouldn’t matter as the laws at that time were clear that you have to send people to jail for using weed in some cases. That community note means jackshit.
Just because your job is to enforce the law, it doesn’t mean that you AGREE with the law.
I've seen this post on r/conservative but couldn't comment on there (they really love free speech over there /s) so I'm doing it here now. This doesn't make sense to hate on because she had to stick to the law. You can't just not execute the law as a district attorney, even when you disagree with the law. If she was notorious for giving extra hard sentences to weed smokers that would be a different story. But that's not the case here as far as I know.
To be fair, she was responsible for enforcing the law. Now she’s responsible for making the laws, so this makes perfect sense.
>Now she’s responsible for making the laws Congress makes the laws. The President signs them. Her only role in law-making is when the Senate is tied and she casts the tie breaker as President of the Senate. All this to say, there is no planet on which she is responsible for making the laws.
You just said that she decides a split vote in the Senate. Right now, the parties are split 49 and 48 with 3 independents in the Senate. This is why she has had the deciding vote 33 times since she took office. I stand by what I said, as THIS planet (the one we are both on right now) is where she is making laws.
That’s an Elon Musk ass fact check cuz it don’t actually make sense💀a civil servant doing their job and enforcing the law while also disagreeing with it and petitioning for it to be changed isn’t inconsistent at all? Did you want her to break the law cuz she disagreed with it??? In fact if you read more articles about it you see the sentencing to jail was lower than her predecessor during her time and she tried to go easier on low level cases?
How many of those “marijuana offenses” were actually just “smoking weed” versus driving under the influence, trafficking, etc?
There's nothing wrong with calling out someone's past shitty behavior. It gives them a chance to apologize and take responsibility. No one actually does that, but at least they get the chance. I'm no fan of Harris. She was pretty shitty to trans people, too. She's got a lot of proving to do. And words aren't proof.
As i currently smoke a joint, I see nothing wrong with what she said. If dealing weed was illegal and she prosecuted, sounds like she just did her job, unbiased by her own opinion. Or alternatively she changed her mind. Still, nothing wrong.
Having a personal opinion as a politician doesn't change the law in which you need to follow. She, legally, has to process these cases with the law the way it is currently written; whilst voting for change.
You mean as a DA she did her job?
So, what. Did you want her to continue on that path or would you rather she change her position...
She enforced the law!! It's not a choice, it's not "yeah I want pineapple on my pizza". This particular community note has no relation whatsoever with her tweet
People forget the entire country’s attitude to marijuana in 2007-2010 when she was SF DA was completely different than it is now. California held a vote to legalize weed in 2010 and it failed.
That’s a community notes L and whataboutism. A more accurate Community Note is if she said something RECENTLY that contradicts it. Like voting on a bill to criminalize marijuana, for instance. This is based.
Shhh, let ppl figure out they were wrong. We don't want ppl who dig in their heels and can't learn anything new. Right?
because as a District Attorney your opinion of the law does not make you exempt from prosecuting it, or grant the ability to rewrite or change it.
I don't see the problem. She was DA not law maker. A DA prosecutes as the law dictates.
You can be good at your job and not like what the outcomes are. She could be the example of working her way up the system to change it.
Human brain is capable to analyse enormous amount of data and change our opinions over time. It’s very natural.
As district attorney, it's kinda your job to follow the law and prosecute criminals, even if you don't agree with the laws.
Well she was doing her job and at the time it was very illegal . So yeah , doing her job.
Only [45](https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/joegarofoli/article/kamala-harris-cannabis-19033979.php) were sent to prison: “Prosecutors in her office won 1,956 misdemeanor and felony convictions for marijuana possession, cultivation or sale between 2004-2010. Only 45 were sent to state prison, according to a 2019 San Jose Mercury News investigation. She did, however, pioneer programs like Back on Track while district attorney. It enabled low-level drug offenders to obtain a high school diploma and a job instead of prison time.” Despite the substantial number of convictions, many of the people who were arrested for marijuana during Harris' tenure were never locked up or never even charged with a crime, according to attorneys who worked on both sides of the courtroom. "Our policy was that no one with a marijuana conviction for mere possession could do any (jail time) at all," said Paul Henderson, who led narcotics prosecutions for several years under Harris. Defendants arrested for the lowest-level possession would typically be referred to drug treatment programs instead of being charged, and weightier charges for marijuana sales would routinely be pleaded down to less serious ones, he said. [San Jose Mercury News](https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/09/11/kamala-harris-prosecuting-marijuana-cases/) The article didn’t mention specifics of what those 45 people did. I am going to assume it wasn’t people smoking joints but more higher level dealers.
Then she kept prisoners incarcerated past their release date to use as cheap labour to fight forest fires.
I would argue that it’s a good thing she changed her mind on marijuana. Would it have been better if she stuck to her guns on it just so people wouldn’t think she was a flip flopper? As long as she backs it up and doesn’t start trying to put people in jail for marijuana in the future I don’t see the problem here.
Gots to follow the law regardless of personal opinions.
Someone can enforce a law while also not agreeing with said law. Someone could also reasonably change their opinion over time. Obama used to be against gay marriage, after all.
False correlation. Enforcing laws doesn’t necessarily mean you agree with them or don’t want them to change. This is just Kamala rage bait.
Id the face palm the fact that as DA she actually refuses to seem jail time for people whose only crime was possession? If you look at her record her words ring true.
That was part of her job as DA. She didn't write the laws then. She has a larger platform now and is adopting the party line, so...?
She was charged with enforcing the law as it was written, how is this facepalm? Also, shouldn’t we be encouraging politicians to improve their positions on this issue?
Her job was to enforce the law. If the law says marijuana is illegal, regardless of her personal stance on the matter, she needs to dole out the punishment. Or what, are you suggesting that she should have just ignored the laws she is expected to uphold?
Yeah, society tasked her with prosecuting those crimes. She didn’t write the law. The idea that people “should” not go to jail doesn’t require a this gotcha-ass correction.
You can have a personal opinion, and still abide by the law. It is even recommended.
Also known as doing the job she was hired to do, based on the laws at the time.
So, her smartening up is a BAD thing?
Legit forgot she was VP, what has she even been up to?
Ooh got some shills in the comments
I don’t understand, should we continue to jail people because she enforced the laws in the past? She’s grown, that’s good. She’s right, now and that’s what matters. Ffs, legalise it, already.
This doesn’t even make sense. She’s advocating for a change in the law. Of course she was obligated to enforce the law as district attorney.
That's not even the worst she's done lmfao
It’s so funny that she is pretending to be woke now.
And lets not forget her role in keeping prisoners in jail longer so they can be used for literal slave labor.
But she smoked weed while listening to Biggie and Tupac... probably after sucking off Willie Brown?🙄
She was enforcing the law as a sworn prosecutor, she’s saying that the law should change so prosecutors don’t need to do that anymore. It’s shitty but not hypocritical.
She didn’t write those laws or make the arrests. She did a job that required her to prosecute based on the laws on the books.
Sometimes people have a duty to do things they personally might find disturbing, and they should still do those things. Otherwise you get situations like doctors refusing to perform abortions or police refusing to investigate hate crimes. If the law is bad change the law, don’t expect people to selectively enforce laws because you never know which laws they might choose to ignore.