Eliminating A Quantifiably Unjust Application of the Law Act of 2021

Floor Speech

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Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 1693, the EQUAL Act, which would eliminate the sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine. I would like to thank my colleagues Representatives Jeffries, Bacon, and Armstrong for their work to bring this bill to the floor today.

In 1986, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act created a 100-to-1 sentencing disparity between the amount of crack cocaine that triggered an automatic 5-year mandatory minimum sentence and the amount of powder cocaine that would trigger the same punishment. This sentencing disparity had a racially disparate impact on Black communities, did nothing to change personal behaviors, and has been a tremendous waste of taxpayer money and resources. There are no pharmacological differences between these two substances. Yet more than 80 percent of people convicted in federal court for crack offenses are Black, while only 27 percent of those convicted of powder cocaine offenses are Black.

The crack cocaine sentencing disparity has forced judges to impose higher penalties for very small amounts of crack cocaine. This also had the bizarre effect of punishing those individuals lower in the drug distribution chain much more severely than the actual drug kingpins for two reasons: the kingpins generally distribute powder from which the crack is produced, and lower level defendants often lack information on the drug operation that they can turn over to prosecutors in order to obtain sentencing credit for cooperation.

Mandatory minimums, whether they are equal or not, must be eliminated. The ``tough on crime'' policies based on slogans and sound bites have failed, and mandatory minimums have been studied extensively--they fail to reduce crime, they waste taxpayers' money and often require judges to impose sentences that violate common sense. Instead of arguing about whether someone should receive a five-year mandatory minimum, we should be investing in early education, workforce training, and our communities.

The EQUAL Act is the next step on the long road toward eliminating this unfair sentencing disparity. In 2009, I led the effort in the House to eliminate this disparity in the Fairness in Cocaine Sentencing Act. That effort eventually led to the 2010 passage of the Fair Sentencing Act, which reduced the crack/powder cocaine disparity from 100:1 to 18:1. That was a hard-fought compromise, and the EQUAL Act will finally end this disparity. This is an important step toward fixing our criminal justice system and making it fairer. I urge my colleagues to support this bill and hope the Senate moves quickly to send this bill to the President's desk.

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