“She [Hillary] said that she will end [private prisons],” -but has said this previously also

[riversedge]

Hillary Clinton meets with prominent leaders of new civil rights movement

The presidential candidate met with founders of Campaign Zero and other delegates Friday, and discussed issues from mass incarceration to protests

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DeRay McKesson’s photo, posted to Twitter, of the meeting with Hillary Clinton. Photograph: DeRay McKesson/Twitter

Oliver Laughland and Lauren Gambino in New York

Friday 9 October 2015 15.38 EDT
Last modified on Friday 9 October 2015 16.24 EDT


Hillary Clinton met with prominent leaders of the new civil rights movement on Friday, including founders of the influential Campaign Zero, telling them she wanted to end the use of private prisons and hinting at the shape her long-awaited policy platform on criminal justice may take.


Members of the delegation told the Guardian that discussions at the Washington DC meeting were productive and wide-ranging, touching on issues from mass incarceration to the policing of protests.

“She [Clinton] was open to being pushed, and I think, in the end, she was reflective,” said DeRay McKesson, a co-founder of Campaign Zero and one of the most high-profile voices to emerge from protests in Ferguson, Missouri beginning last August.

Although Clinton did not provide concrete policy initiatives and gave no indication of when her criminal-justice platform would be announced, McKesson noted she made strident remarks on prison reform.

“She said that she will end [private prisons],” he said – something she has called for publicly and is already a part of her current criminal justice platform. “She said she is trying to figure out how to end federal funding going to them, ending them that way. And [she gave] sort of a broad acknowledgement that the conditions in prison need to be different.”

The multi-billion dollar private prison industry has come under increasing criticism from rights activists, who point to poor conditions and the disproportionate incarceration of young, black males in for-profit facilities.................



***Ending private prisons has been on her website since APRIL of 2015:bounce:

https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/criminal-justice-reform/



Criminal justice reform

Our criminal justice system is out of balance.

“I will never stop working on issues of equality and opportunity, race, and justice. That is a promise. I’ve done it my entire adult life. I will always be in your corner.”

Hillary, JULY 31, 2015

Our criminal justice system is out of balance. Although the United States has less than 5 percent of the world’s population, we have almost 25 percent of the total prison population. A significant percentage of the more than 2 million Americans incarcerated today are low-level, nonviolent offenders. African American men are far more likely to be stopped and searched by police, charged with crimes, and sentenced to longer prison terms. There are an estimated 1.5 million black men who are missing from their families and communities because of incarceration and premature death.

In order to reform our criminal justice system, we need to recognize some hard truths about race in America. From Ferguson to Staten Island to Baltimore, Hillary has said the patterns are unmistakable and undeniable: The tragic deaths of Michael Brown, Walter Scott, Tamir Rice, Eric Garner, and Freddie Gray are a reminder of the need to address race in America, reform our criminal justice system, and move the nation forward.

“Black lives matter. Everyone in this country should stand firmly behind that... Since this campaign started, I've been talking about the work we must do to address the systemic inequities that persist in education, in economic opportunity, in our justice system. But we have to do more than talk—we have to take action.”

Hillary, JULY 20, 2015



“There is something profoundly wrong when African American men are still far more likely to be stopped and searched by police, charged with crimes, and sentenced to longer prison terms than are meted out to their white counterparts.”

Hillary, APRIL 29, 2015

Hillary will work to fix these disparities by:

Ending the era of mass incarceration. As president, Hillary will work to reform our criminal justice system by changing the way we approach punishment and prison. She will reform mandatory minimum sentences for low-level nonviolent offenses, increase support for mental health and drug treatment, pursue alternative punishments for low-level offenders, and phase out private prisons......

[stonecutter357]

1. K&R!