“In Their Own Words: Prosecutors On The Politics Of Backlash”

The title of this post is the title of this new paper authored by Joshua Davis and Whitney Taylor now available via SSRN. Here is its abstract:

This article examines the rise and politicization of prosecutorial reforms in the United States.  While progressive and conservative prosecutors have initiated reforms in jurisdictions throughout the United States, recent reform efforts have been met with media scrutiny and political backlash.  How do prosecutors understand and respond to efforts to limit reforms? What are the effects of this attention?  To explore these questions, we draw on an analysis of U.S. prosecutors who ran for office in 2024 as well as sixty semi-structured interviews with current and former prosecutors, as well as candidates for the position.  We argue that backlash against prosecutors is a significant phenomenon that has important consequences for individuals, the criminal justice system, and local democracy.

Our interviews show that backlash is pervasive and ranges beyond recall elections (and the attempt to make recalls possible where they once were not) and efforts to replace or remove sitting prosecutors through executive or legislative intervention.  Elected prosecutors often have to navigate challenges from the media, other prosecutors, judges, and law enforcement, and many face verbal attacks and physical threats from members of the public as well as the police.  Prosecutors respond to this backlash in three primary ways: (1) by simply ignoring the backlash and continuing to do what they have always done, (2) by avoiding or slowing down reforms and opting into other career paths, and (3) by continuing to pursue reforms, but doing so under the radar, trying not to draw attention to them. Ultimately, we show that backlash has had a chilling effect on reform prosecutors, pushing some reformers out of office and forcing others to abandon reforms or try to carry out reform programs under personally and professionally fraught conditions.