Midterm Voters Send Signal to Move Forward on Criminal Legal Reforms

Despite months of campaign ads bombarding voters with bodybag imagery, grainy crime scene videos, and threats about dangers awaiting them if the “soft-on-crime” candidate prevailed, Tuesday’s election results suggest that fear mongering about crime was not a winning strategy across the country. Nowhere was this fear-driven narrative more visible than in elected prosecutor contests. Yet in race after race, across red and blue states, the results underscore that communities don’t want to return to past failed practices that drove decades of mass incarceration.

• In Minnesota, Mary Moriarty was elected Hennepin County (Minneapolis and nearby suburbs) Attorney after previously serving as the county’s chief public defender. She ran on a platform that included promoting alternatives to incarceration and restorative justice, enhancing police oversight and addressing racial disparities.
• In Oklahoma County (Oklahoma City), Oklahoma, voters chose Vicki Behenna, the former Executive Director of the Oklahoma Innocence Project.
• In Tennessee, Steve Mulroy won an eight-year term as Shelby County (Memphis) District Attorney in August, promising more transparency into the office's work and besting tough-on-crime incumbent Amy Weirich, who prosecuted a Black woman with a criminal record simply for trying to register to vote.

This pattern carried into resounding reelection wins as well. In communities that previously elected a reform-minded prosecutor and saw firsthand the impact of their policies, voters reelected District Attorneys from Texas to North Carolina, Alabama to Indiana, and Vermont to Tennessee. With some races still to be called, reform-minded prosecutors will represent nearly 20 percent of Americans.

The midterm election also saw voters across the country advance criminal justice and legal reform through ballot initiatives.

• Maryland and Missouri voted to legalize recreational marijuana.
• Colorado voted to legalize certain psychedelics, delivering a huge win for the principles of harm reduction.
• Texas voters in five cities joined Austin to decriminalize marijuana possession.

The use of crime as a fear mongering tactic isn't over, but reform-minded DAs and a growing, educated voter base remain committed to safety and accountability as traditional prosecutors, championing policies that are grounded in research showing that reform makes communities safer and healthier.

To read more details about progressive criminal and legal reform wins from the US Midterm results, visit "Midterm Elections Deliver Some Good News for Criminal Legal Reform" at The Appeal.