As highlighted by this NPR preview, the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) kicks off tonight and concludes Sunday with former Prez Trump giving his first big speech since leaving office. Though there are lots and lots of storylines surrounding this year's CPAC, and I was intrigued to see a few criminal justice reform programs appearing on the CPAC 2021 agenda.
Notably, one theme for various CPAC panels is the Bill of Rights, with Senator Mike Lee slated to give a speech tomorrow morning titled "Why the Left Hates the Bill of Rights... and We Love It." But it is not exactly clear that the CPAC folks really loves ALL of the Bill of Rights: the CPAC agenda has a whole lot more folks slated to speak about those parts of the Bill of Rights that primarily deal with civil rights rather than criminal defendant rights. For example, the Fifth Amendment panel on the first day has four participants focused on "Freedom from Confiscation of Private Property" and nobody speaking about the array of criminal procedure protections also in the Fifth Amendment. Still, it is encouraging to see that there will be these panels on the even Amendments dealing with criminal issues:
Amendment IV: Unreasonable Search and Seizures
Louis Reed, Dream Corps Justice
Pastor Darrell Scott, CEO of National Diversity Coalition for Trump
Moderated by David Safavian, American Conservative Union
Amendment VI: Rights of the Accused
KT McFarland, American Conservative Union Foundation Board Member
Amendment VIII: Cruel and Unusual Punishment: Does Tough on Crime Messaging Work on Election Day?
Doug Deason, Deason Capital Services LLC
Rep. Byron Donalds (FL-19)
Jim McLaughlin, Pollster for President Trump
Fmr. Rep. Mark Walker (NC-06)
Moderated by Brett Tolman, American Conservative Union Foundation
I find it a bit discouraging to see only two panelists scheduled to discuss the Fourth Amendment and a single person due to talk about the Sixth Amendment (while panels on the "hot button" Third and Seventh Amendments are together bigger). I find it even more discouraging that the panel on the Eighth Amendment, an amendment intended to preclude certain extreme forms of punishment no matter their political support, is going to be all about about whether extreme forms of punishment are still politically popular.
Still, I am glad these topics will be covered, and this one additional CPAC 2021 panel is especially interesting:
Conservative Prosecutors: Conservative Reforms
David O. Leavitt, Prosecutor for Utah County
Brett Tolman, American Conservative Union Foundation
Kent Volkmer, Pinal County Attorney
Tori Verber Salazar, DA for San Joaquin County, CA
Moderated by Chelsea Murphy, Right on Crime
As regular readers know, the so-called "progressive prosecutor" movement truly is a hot topic in criminal-justice reform and academic circles. I am quite intrigued to see a panel at CPAC embrace the label "Conservative Prosecutors," and I am very interested to hear what conservative prosecutors would consider "conservative reforms."
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