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The paper just had to find the right kind of criminals.
Earlier this week, the New York Times editorial board declared with great alarm that “The People Trump Pardoned Are on a Crime Spree.” President Donald Trump has issued many pardons and grants of clemency, as have his predecessors. The worst of these decisions, says the board, was Trump’s grant of “clemency on the first day of his second term to everyone who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.” That clemency was extended to approximately 1,500 participants in the infamous riot universally known by the date on which it occurred: January 6. Whether it was wise to issue a mass clemency to the rioters is a debatable proposition, but whether those rioters have since gone on a crime spree is an empirical question with a clear answer: Not even close.
The Times’ editorial tells readers that the results of the clemency “have been disastrous.” Big, if true! But the claim doesn’t hold up under even modest scrutiny. Here is what the board considers damning evidence: “At least 12 of the pardoned rioters have since been charged with other serious crimes, including child molestation, assault, harassment, murder plots and charges related to a vicious dog attack.”
Twelve, you say!?
“Disastrous” is about as dishonest a characterization for a recidivism rate of less than 1% as one can imagine. For context, national data show that more than 80% of released state prisoners — most of whom are released (typically after less than two years) onto parole after serving an average of about 44% of their maximum sentence, despite having around 10 prior arrests and five prior convictions — in America are rearrested for a new crime. On average, state prison releasees will generate five new rearrests over a 10-year period. Now, who would bet on the Times running an editorial decrying the practice of early parole, or calling for longer sentences? I certainly wouldn’t.
Continue reading the entire piece here at the Daily Wire
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Rafael Mangual is the Nick Ohnell Fellow and head of research for the Policing and Public Safety Initiative at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of City Journal. He is also the author of Criminal (In)Justice: What the Push for Decarceration and Depolicing Gets Wrong and Who It Hurts Most.
