Between The Lines - Nicole Fortier: 'Solutions' Chronicles Growing Consensus Advocating Reform of the U.S. Criminal Justice System (Week Ending May 15, 2015)

Award-winning Investigative Journalist Robert Parry (1949-2018)

Award-winning investigative journalist and founder/editor of ConsortiumNews.com, Robert Parry has passed away. His ground-breaking work uncovering Reagan-era dirty wars in Central America and many other illegal and immoral policies conducted by successive administrations and U.S. intelligence agencies, stands as an inspiration to all in journalists working in the public interest.

Robert had been a regular guest on our Between The Lines and Counterpoint radio shows -- and many other progressive outlets across the U.S. over four decades.

His penetrating analysis of U.S. foreign policy and international conflicts will be sorely missed, and not easily replaced. His son Nat Parry writes a tribute to his father: Robert Parry’s Legacy and the Future of Consortiumnews.

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The Resistance Starts Now!

Between The Lines' coverage and resource compilation of the Resistance Movement

"The man who predicted Trump presidential win now says Trump impeachment could happen," AM Joy with Joy Reid, MSNBC, Jan. 21, 2018
"Sketchy Kazakh money finds its way into Trump dealings," The Rachel Maddow Show, MSNBC, Jan. 15, 2018
"Red flags seen in many Trump real estate deals," The Rachel Maddow Show, MSNBC, Jan. 15, 2018
"Secret Money: How Trump Made Millions Selling Condos To Unknown Buyers," BuzzFeed, Jan. 12, 2018
"The Scandals of Donald Trump: Presidential Edition," The Atlantic, May 15, 2017
"Here's what we know so far about Team Trump's ties to Russian interests," Washington Post's ongoing compilation
"What Comey Was Investigating, Explained," The Moscow Project, Center for American Progress

"Donald Trump's Financial Ties to Russian Oligarchs and Mobsters Detailed In Explosive New Documentary from the Netherlands," Dutch TV documentary, Alternet.org, May 12, 2017
Ongoing compilation of Trump's creeping authoritarianism," MotherJones.com
Full resource list ...

SPECIAL REPORT: "The Resistance - Women's March 2018 - Hartford, Connecticut" Jan. 20, 2018

Selected speeches from the Women's March in Hartford, Connecticut 2018, recorded and produced by Scott Harris

SPECIAL REPORT: "No Fracking Waste in CT!" Jan. 14, 2018

Jen Siskind Jennifer Siskind, local coordinator for Food and Water Watch, describes the campaign to stop fracking waste in Connecticut, which so far has led to fracking waste bans in 34 towns around the state. Interviewed by Richard Hill on Mic Check, WPKN Radio, Bridgeport, CT

SPECIAL REPORT: "Resistance Round Table: The Unraveling Continues..." Jan. 13, 2018

Lindsay Kanaly The panel discusses Trump's long history of racism and the Republican voter suppression juggernaut confronting Democrats leading up to the 2018 elections. Special guest: Lindsay Kanaly, a lead organizer of the Women's Marches planned for Jan. 20, 2018. Panel: Scott Harris, Ruthanne Baumgartner and Richard Hill on Resistance Roundtable, WPKN Radio, Bridgeport, CT.

SPECIAL REPORT: "Capitalism to the ash heap?" Richard Wolff, Jan. 2, 2018

Richard Wolff, Economics professor Richard Wolff declares U.S. capitalism to be beyond repair and suggests the need for a radical alternative. Interviewed by Richard Hill

SPECIAL REPORT: Maryn McKenna, author of "Big Chicken", Dec. 7, 2017

Maryn McKenna, investigative journalist and author of Big Chicken, talks about the widespread use and dangers of antibiotics in commercial poultry, beef and fruit production. Interview by Bill Duesing, Richard Hill and Guy Beardsly on WPKN's Organic Farm Stand.

SPECIAL REPORT: Nina Turner's address, Working Families Party Awards Banquet, Dec. 14, 2017

Nina Turner, president of Our Revolution, talks about the fight ahead for progressives as she receives the Working Families Organization Award for Exceptional Leadership Towards Advancing Progress. The event was held in Meriden, CT. Produced by Richard Hill.

SPECIAL REPORT: Mic Check, Dec. 12, 2017

Working Families Party of CT talks strategy and issues for 2018.
Lindsay Farrell, executive director of the Working Families Party of Connecticut, discusses the state's electoral landscape and lays out the issues and strategies that could lead to progressive victories in 2018. Interviewed by Richard Hill.

SPECIAL REPORT: Resistance Roundtable, Dec. 9, 2017

Disturbing developments in the Trump/Republican Agenda
Focus on the tax bill, destruction of our public lands, North Korea and Trump's private CIA. Panel: Scott Harris, Ruthanne Baumgartner and Richard Hill. Special guest: Jo Macallero of Rise and Resist.

SPECIAL REPORT: On Tyranny - one year later, Nov. 28, 2017

Professor Timothy Snyder, author of the highly acclaimed resistance manual On Tyranny, discusses his book and offers a fresh assessment of the state of our beleaguered republic. Timothy Snyder, history professor at Yale, is introduced by Stanley Heller, administrator of Promoting Enduring Peace, a Connecticut-based organization that sponsored this event at the United Church Parish House in New Haven on Nov. 28. A brief interview with Snyder conducted by WPKN radio producer, Richard Hill, follows his talk.

SPECIAL REPORT: Mic Check, Nov. 12, 2017

Lynne Ide, director of program and policy with the Universal Health Care Foundation of Connecticut, talks about the current state of health care coverage in Connecticut. Interviewed by Richard Hill, WPKN radio producer

SPECIAL REPORT: Resistance Roundtable, Nov. 11, 2017

Focus on the Republican tax plan, the just-released autopsy on the Democratic Party, and Internet censorship by Google, Facebook and Youtube. Including an interview with Hilary Grant, a lead organizer with Action Together Connecticut, who discusses the local results of the recent election, with hosts Richard Hill, Scott Harris and Ruth Baumgartner WPKN producers

SPECIAL REPORT: Rainy Day Radio, Nov. 7, 2017

Two leaders from Redneck Revolt, an anti-racist, anti-capitalist movement, talk about their work organizing with white working class people in Suffolk County, New York. Interviewed by Richard Hill, WPKN radio producer

SPECIAL REPORT: Rainy Day Radio, Nov. 7, 2017

Bruce Gagnon, coordinator for the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space, describes the extent of -- and motives underlying -- the vast US network of military bases around the globe. Interviewed by Richard Hill, WPKN radio producer

SPECIAL REPORT: Resisting U.S. JeJu Island military base in South Korea, Oct. 24, 2017

Joyakol, South Korean peace activist and singer, discusses the crisis on the Korean peninsula and focuses on the resistance to the U.S. huge military base being constructed on Jeju Island. The event was sponsored by the Greater New Haven Peace Council and this audio was recorded by Richard Hill, WPKN producer.
Joyakol discusses Americans' biggest misconceptions about the conflict between North and South Korea and the U.S., Interview by Richard Hill, WPKN producer.

SPECIAL REPORT: John Allen, Out in New Haven

John Allen, founding director of the New Haven Pride Center, Connecticut, talks about his new LGBTQ television show, Out in New Haven, which presents a range of political and cultural issues to the community. Interviewed by Richard Hill on WPKN's Rainy Day Tuesday, Jan. 2, 2018.

2017 Gandhi Peace Awards

Promoting Enduring Peace presented its Gandhi Peace Award jointly to renowned consumer advocate Ralph Nader and BDS founder Omar Barghouti on April 23, 2017.

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THANK YOU TO EVERYONE...

who helped make our 25th anniversary with Jeremy Scahill a success!

For those who missed the event, or were there and really wanted to fully absorb its import, here it is in video

Jeremy Scahill keynote speech, part 1 from PROUDEYEMEDIA on Vimeo.

Jeremy Scahill keynote speech, part 2 from PROUDEYEMEDIA on Vimeo.

Between The Lines on Stitcher

Between The Lines Presentation at the Left Forum 2016

"How Do We Build A Mass Movement to Reverse Runaway Inequality?" with Les Leopold, author of "Runaway Inequality: An Activist's Guide to Economic Justice,"May 22, 2016, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, The City University of New York, 860 11th Ave. (Between 58th and 59th), New York City. Between The Lines' Scott Harris and Richard Hill moderated this workshop. Listen to the audio/slideshows and more from this workshop.

Listen to audio of the plenary sessions from the weekend.

JEREMY SCAHILL: Oscar-nominated documentary filmmaker "Dirty Wars"

Listen to the full interview (30:33) with Jeremy Scahill, an award-winning investigative journalist with the Nation Magazine, correspondent for Democracy Now! and author of the bestselling book, "Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army," about America's outsourcing of its military. In an exclusive interview with Counterpoint's Scott Harris on Sept. 16, 2013, Scahill talks about his latest book, "Dirty Wars, The World is a Battlefield," also made into a documentary film under the same title, and was nominated Dec. 5, 2013 for an Academy Award in the Best Documentary Feature category.

Listen to Scott Harris Live on WPKN Radio

Between The Lines' Executive Producer Scott Harris hosts a live, weekly talk show, Counterpoint, from which some of Between The Lines' interviews are excerpted. Listen every Monday evening from 8 to 10 p.m. EDT at www.WPKN.org (Follows the 5-7 minute White Rose Calendar.)

Counterpoint in its entirety is archived after midnight ET Monday nights, and is available for at least a year following broadcast in WPKN Radio's Archives.

You can also listen to full unedited interview segments from Counterpoint, which are generally available some time the day following broadcast.

Subscribe to Counterpoint bulletins via our subscriptions page.

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New Book Chronicles Growing Consensus Advocating U.S. Criminal Justice System Reform

Posted May 6, 2015

Interview with Nicole Fortier, counsel with the Brennan Center’s Justice Program and associate editor of the book "Solutions", conducted by Melinda Tuhus

Over the past two decades, jails and prisons in the U.S. have incarcerated an increasing number of people, most of whom have not been convicted of violent or even serious crimes. There are now more than two million inmates behind bars and many politicians on the left, right and middle recognizing that the status quo is untenable have called for reforms. Incarceration rates have remained high in the U.S., even as crime rates have fallen dramatically.

"The New Jim Crow," a book by Michelle Alexander, was a wake-up call for many, especially among progressive activists. But a new book from the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law titled, “Solutions: American Leaders Speak Out on Criminal Justice,” is now also making waves. Bill Clinton, who ironically pushed for many get tough on crime measures when he was president, wrote the forward to the book in which he said, change is being driven by "a desire to save taxpayers money; the resolve to promote rehabilitation, not recidivism; an obligation to honor religious values and the necessity to alleviate crushing racial imbalances.”

In “Solutions,” 15 well-known politicians – including most declared and likely presidential candidates – joined criminal justice experts to write 1,500-word essays on how to address the over-incarceration of Americans. Policy changes advocated included ending mandatory minimum sentences, more drug treatment and mental health counseling, alternatives to incarceration, more re-entry programs and an end to the death penalty, among others. Between The Lines’ Melinda Tuhus spoke with Nicole Fortier, counsel with the Brennan Center’s Justice Program and an associate editor of “Solutions.” Here, she describes the negative impacts of over-incarceration and the policy changes proposed in the book by contributors from across the political spectrum.

NICOLE FORTIER: With the events in Ferguson, Staten Island, and now Baltimore, we really were wondering where they felt the future in criminal justice reform was. And beyond that we also wanted to seek out criminal justice experts who could really help the average reader understand these issues further.

BETWEEN THE LINES: In briefly perusing the responses, I saw some things appear again and again, like more mental health and addiction treatment, more re-entry programs. But Chris Christie proposed something I hadn't seen from other essays, which was to reduce pre-trial detention. Some people are held without bail, but most people who can make bail are released before trial, and I've read that they have better outcomes in the criminal justice system than those who can't. Is that right?

NICOLE FORTIER: I think studies show that the more people in pre-trial detention – essentially in jail while they await trial – are more likely to be sentenced, to be sentenced for longer periods of time and really go further into the system. I think one of the reasons that those studies come out that way and those are the results, when you're in jail, sometimes trials can take a long time before they actually begin, so there begins to be this huge pressure to take a plea deal and just move forward, rather than sit in jail and not be able to get to your family, not be able to get to work, not be able to do a lot of things. So there's more pressure to plead guilty and there's also just more chances that you'll be sentenced. But Chris Christie's was just a very interesting reform that he championed in New Jersey. It was two-fold: There was an aspect of it where he thought it was just inherently unfair the way New Jersey's law worked before they changed it, was that so long as you could afford bail you could get out and if you couldn't, then you could not. There was no alternative to monetary bail. So what he saw happening were cases where very dangerous people who could afford bail would get out, while people who were there for very low-level non-violent crimes were stuck because they couldn't afford it. So he championed two different changes to be able to give people alternatives so they need not pay to get out of jail. It includes a slew of things: staying in school or work could be an option, having a sort of guardian appointed to check on you is another option. And at the same time, he gave judges the option to be able to say that someone is incredibly dangerous and could hurt people if they were out so that they would stay.

BETWEEN THE LINES: I've always just accepted the system of cash bail as part of the woodwork, but I read an article in Mother Jones last year that made me realize how discriminatory our bail system is against the poor and low-income folks.

NICOLE FORTIER: I think, sadly and very unfortunately, our criminal justice policies have targeted the poor and low-income neighborhoods in particular, I don't think on purpose, per se, but the idea behind bail is you want to have a reason people would come back, and money is where the government goes to. You think about civil cases, for example, it surrounds the idea of money. Money can be used for compensation; it's what's important to people. But in reality, not everybody has access to money, so if you have a $10,000 bail, you can try to do (ten percent) cash; if you don't have $1,000, then you can't get out of jail. And some people also don't think it's worth it if that $1,000 means they can't pay their rent or buy their children clothing, so they opt to stay in jail.

BETWEEN THE LINES: What stood out to you and others at the Brennan Center as the most common or most popular suggestions, even across party lines?

NICOLE FORTIER: I think the one thing that I didn't expect and that I found incredibly remarkable was how many of them actually identified – maybe not using this terminology – but identified mass incarceration as the actual issue. Even three years ago, I don't think that would have been what happened. So it's really a turning point to see them agree on what the problem is and focus on solutions all together. I really found all of the policy solutions really interesting; I do think though that there was a trend of treatment over punishment. I saw that in a lot of the essays. And I'd have to say the one I saw pop up two or three times in different essays were references to things that Texas is doing in the past five years; and I think it's been doing it without anyone really paying attention. Texas has really adopted a lot of alternatives to incarceration; really creative ways to give financial incentives to their criminal justice actors, be they police, prosecutors or parole or probation officers to deter them from bringing more people into prison. It was interesting to see how many of the essays of people in Texas and out of Texas were pointing to Texas as a good example.

BETWEEN THE LINES: That's really interesting, since Texas is most known as the death penalty capital of America. When you said you think all these people wouldn't have identified mass incarceration as the problem three years ago, what do you think has changed?

NICOLE FORTIER: There's been more books, more talks. All of that has been happening more. I think also the Obama administration has been shining a light to it slowly but surely, especially former Attorney General Eric Holder started talking about it a little more directly. And I think what we've also been seeing is that in 2008, when we hit our financial crisis, our criminal justice system was still costing a lot of money, simply because so many people were caught up in it. And so when it costs so much money each year – hundreds of billions, really – and you're trying to cut the budgets of everything, it became really problematic and I think a lot of politicians in particular really had to pay attention to that suddenly, and it was making them really rethink what was worth it, what wasn't, what's a priority, what's not.

For more information on the Brennan Center’s Justice Program, visit brennancenter.org, for more information on “Solutions: American Leaders Speak Out on Criminal Justice,” visit brennancenter.org/publication/solutions-american-leaders-speak-out-criminal-justice.