NEW YORK – Almost six months after the death of George Floyd, criminal justice reform advocates are cheering the election of a handful of progressive prosecutors, the passage of ballot initiatives designed to ease mass incarceration and the decriminalization of drugs in several states.Voters also sent Black Lives Matter activists to Congress, restored voting rights to former prisoners and scored other gains sought by the protests that filled American streets last summer.
Leaders in the movement want to build on those successes in 2021.The aim was to “build a multiracial coalition that could translate the movement power we saw in the streets into electoral might.