The Movements for and against "Progressive" Prosecutors.

Prosecutors are locally elected officials with significant discretion at the front-end of the criminal legal system, including over charges, bail recommendations, and plea deals. Since 2016, a timeframe scholars tie to the Movement for Black Lives, "progressive" prosecutors have been elected in growing numbers on pledges to ameliorate the racialized harms of mass incarceration. Simultaneously, countermovements have emerged to challenge progressive prosecutors’ discretion and tenures. The rise of progressive prosecutors, and the variation in the resistance they face, provides an important case from which to study reformative political movements and the role of race and gender in shaping resistance to these processes. Therefore, my dissertation asks:

1. What is the extent and impact of extra-electoral challenges – such as impeachments and suspensions – confronting prosecutors?

   • Paper under review; presented at ASC, ASA, and policy fora

2. What are the potential mechanisms driving these extra-electoral challenges against prosecutors? 

3. How do the dueling movements for and against "progressive" prosecutors shape the field of criminal justice and opportunities for a smaller, more equitable legal system?

To address these questions, I am using archival methods to construct an original database of all prosecutors in office in 2012 and/or 2022 in the country's 300 most-populous jurisdictions; an API key to collect data from nearly 10,000 media articles; and observations at prosecutor functions. I plan to make my quantitative datasets publicly accessible following publication.

Earlier public scholarship I authored on the potential and pitfalls of prosecutor reform can be found here and here.