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We Call on President Biden to Use Clemency Power
December 9, 2024–Due Process Institute, Right on Crime, and undersigned state and national conservative organizations urged President Biden to use executive clemency power to allow people who have already served years—sometimes decades—in federal prison and who would receive significantly shorter prison terms if they were sentenced today an opportunity to come home. There are many thousands of people in our federal prisons serving disproportionately long sentences for offenses that would result in much shorter prison terms if they were sentenced today under current law and practice. An example of this situation can be found in the First Step
Act, a major piece of legislation we all supported that was enacted by your predecessor. The First Step Act reined in the use of sentence stacking under 18 USC sec. 942(c) such that a sentencing enhancement could not be applied unless charges for the prior offense had become final. In short, prosecutors can no longer charge multiple counts of violating 924(c) in the same indictment to obtain 55-year sentences like in the infamous case of Weldon Angelos. According to the United States Sentencing Commission, the exact same behavior that would have required a 55-year mandatory minimum sentence prior to enactment of the First Step Act now merits a 15-year sentence. There is no deterrence value in preserving such sentences.
This is a critical opportunity to grant clemency for people who did not benefit from changes made by the First Step Act, people who were subject to the crack-powder cocaine sentencing disparity, and people who have spent decades in prison but cannot apply for compassionate release simply because they were sentenced under the “old law” before the adoption of the Federal Sentencing Guidelines.
Update #1: On December 12, President Biden granted clemency for nearly 1,500 justice impacted individuals. You can read the statement here.
Update #2: On January 17, 2025, President Biden commuted the sentences of nearly 2,500 people who had received disproportionally long sentences for nonviolent drug offenses, many of which were based on discredited distinctions between crack and powder cocaine. You can read the statement here.
We Urge President Biden to Provide Relief to All Individuals On CARES Act Home Confinement
September 15, 2021–Due Process Institute signed a letter with a coalition of organizations calling on President Joe Biden to grant clemency to all individuals on CARES Act home confinement and not exclude a subset of people based on an arbitrary criteria.
All of these people – regardless of the type of offense they committed or the number of years remaining on their sentence – have demonstrated that they should not be in prison. There is no public safety benefit to reincarcerating any of them, and yet the costs of separating them from their families, communities, and jobs would be enormous. We urge you to reject applying arbitrary criteria unmoored to public safety needs that will produce massive injustices.
Furthermore, many on CARES Act home confinement have forged deep and important connections with their children after years of separation. Many are working hard at jobs they aspired to for years. These are diligent workers who don’t take their employment for granted. They are saving money, buying cars, taking out mortgages, planning weddings. They are living full and productive lives. All of them deserve a chance to move on with their lives.
We Urge President Biden to Commute Sentences of Individuals on Home Confinement
July 19, 2021–Due Process Institute joined a coalition representing a broad spectrum of American life to urge President Biden to commute the sentences of people currently living in home confinement through the CARES Act but are under threat of being sent back to federal prison.
Last year, Congress passed the CARES Act which expanded the federal government’s ability to move people from federal prison to serve their sentences at home. These individuals had to meet numerous stringent requirements set by the administration to be allowed to enter home confinement, including that they will not be a risk to public safety. According to publicly available data, less than one percent have violated the terms of their release once transferred to home confinement.
Despite the successes of this program, thousands of people are now in danger of being sent back to federal prison. This is because on January 15, 2021, just five days before President Trump left office, the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel issued a memo declaring that people transferred to home confinement under the CARES Act would be sent back to prison once the national COVID emergency ended.
We urge President Biden to grant clemency now to people under CARES Act home confinement and provide second chances to thousands of people who are already safely out of prison, reintegrating back into society, reconnecting with their loved ones, getting jobs and going back to school.
We Call for Federal Clemency Reform
March 26, 2021–Due Process Institute and a bipartisan coalition issued a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland calling for reform of the federal clemency system. The existing review system is in crisis with over 15,000 petitions pending that cannot be resolved because of an overly bureaucratic process involving the Deputy Attorney General and the White House Counsel. However, the crisis can be addressed if needless bureaucracy is eliminated and the Pardon Attorney is appointed as chief of staff to an advisory board of qualified individuals charged with evaluating cases and making recommendations directly to the President. Furthermore, removing prosecutors as the principal evaluators of clemency petitions provides fresh eyes free of institutional conflict.
Clemency petitions can play a key role in addressing long-standing racial equity concerns in the federal criminal legal system. In addition, we urge that several other categories of clemency petitions should be prioritized for review, including the elderly and chronically ill, those in prison for marijuana offenses, those currently on home confinement, women over-sentenced as “accessories” to crimes, those who have received harsh trial penalties, and those sentenced under mandatory minimum sentences.
DPI Urges Clemency During COVID-19
March 24, 2020–In the face of the COVID-19 crisis and the unique public health risk presented in our nation’s jails and prisons, Due Process Institute joined a bipartisan group calling on President Trump to utilize his clemency powers to commute the sentences of populations who are exceptionally vulnerable in this pandemic.
DPI Staff Quoted by CBS News on Clemency
September 27, 2019–“The DOJ is comprised of the people that put these people behind bars in the first place,” said Joe Luppino-Esposito, the director of Rule of Law initiatives at Due Process Institute. “It’s a little odd the clemency process happens within the same department.”
Due Process Institute has supported many individuals in their petitions for clemency.