Dear Friends,
Bruce Springsteen (a native New Jerseyan) released a new song this week about Minneapolis. Listening to it, I was struck by how much it captures this moment, where grief, anger, and persistence — especially persistence — coexist. It’s a time where the work of justice continues, even when the world around us feels fraught and fragile.
That’s the frame I’ve been holding onto as I look at the recent justice wins in my home state of New Jersey, which brought meaningful reforms for people seeking second chances, immigrants, survivors of violence, and people with criminal records. These are concrete victories with real consequences for people’s lives, and there are lessons here for states across the country.
I hope you’ll put on the latest Springsteen track, Streets of Minneapolis, and take a moment to read about, and maybe even take comfort from, these four victories for justice. They help remind us that good things can still happen even in times of darkness.
Clemency Initiative That Changed Hundreds of Lives
One of the most meaningful experiences of my professional career was serving as an appointed member of New Jersey’s Clemency Advisory Board in support of Governor Murphy’s historic clemency initiative. For the first time in modern history, New Jersey created a formal process to review clemency applications with an emphasis on mercy, rehabilitation, and fairness.
The results were extraordinary. Governor Murphy granted clemency to 455 people, including pardons and commutations for individuals who had demonstrated growth, accountability, and readiness to return to their communities. Ultimately, these clemency decisions recognized that people are more than the worst thing they have ever done and that a justice system worthy of its name must leave room for redemption.
Lives and communities have been forever altered. This was a major win for justice.
The Survivors Justice Act
Another major step forward for second chances in New Jersey was the passage of the Survivors Justice Act, which recognizes in law what survivors of domestic and sexual violatence have long known: abuse, coercion, and trauma often play a direct role in bringing people into contact with the criminal legal system. Justice requires that reality to be taken seriously.
The Act has two critical components.
First, it allows judges to consider a person’s history of domestic or sexual violence as a mitigating factor in sentencing when that victimization is connected to the offense. Significantly, it also allows for currently incarcerated people to seek resentencing if they can show that their abuse contributed to their offense.
Second, it allows eligible people to expunge criminal records tied to their abuse, reducing lifelong barriers to housing, employment, and safety.
New Jersey joins a growing number of states, including Georgia, New York, Illinois and Oklahoma, in passing survivor justice laws. It’s a powerful recognition for survivors of abuse and violence, and acknowledges that crime should be examined in context.
The Safe Communities Act, Protecting Immigrants
Then there’s the newly enacted Safe Communities Act, a first step toward protecting immigrant communities and strengthens public safety for everyone. At its core, the Safe Communities Act recognizes that people should be able to report crimes, seek medical care, send their children to school, and access essential services without fear of immigration consequences, and provides a framework for the adoption of new policies at the state-level. While the new immigration law was not as sweeping as advocates had hoped, it sends a strong message that people being driven deeper into the shadows by ICE enforcement deserve our support and protection.
Opening the Jury Box
Finally, New Jersey took an important step toward a more inclusive and legitimate justice system by allowing people with criminal records to serve on juries. For decades, people with convictions were categorically excluded from jury service, even after they had completed their sentences and rebuilt their lives.
This change matters. Jury service is one of the clearest expressions of civic participation and belonging. Excluding people with records not only perpetuated stigma but also distorted the jury pool, particularly in communities most impacted by crime and criminalization.
Bruce Stands with Minnesota
If you know me, you know I’m a huge Bruce Springsteen fan. Always have been. I’m a Jersey girl who grew up listening to Bruce throughout my childhood. Born in the USA was one of my first concerts. So you can imagine how thrilled I was to see Bruce come out with a new song, Streets of Minneapolis, honoring the memories of Renee Nicole Goode and Alex Pretti, and also celebrating the ordinary Minnesotans who are bravely standing up for our democracy. It’s a reminder that we are stronger when we stand together. As I mentioned in my last post, if you want to support the people of Minnesota, you can find some great action ideas on the “Stand With Minnesota” website.
If you haven’t yet contacted your elected officials, consider doing it now. We need to keep the pressure on. Demand that your representatives stop funding ICE. Demand that they fight for justice. Demand that they do what’s right, even if what is right is also what is hard. Our bruised and fragile democracy deserves no less.
I’ve been talking with some inspirational people on Just Justice. They have overcome tremendous adversity and seized on their second chances at freedom to do amazing things.
My latest podcast episode, “Sentenced to Life Without Parole as a Child,” features April Barber-Scales, who was condemned to die in prison in 1991 as a pregnant fifteen-year-old. In 2022, April received a rare commutation from North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper, and she has since dedicated herself to advocating for people in prison and challenging extreme sentencing practices through her organization Fenced In: Fighting For Freedom Advocacy and her writing, including a memoir of the same name.
Also available is “Writing His Way Out: Emile Suotonye DeWeaver on Abolition and Imagination.” Emile, author of Ghosts in the Criminal Justice Machine: Reform, White Supremacy, and an Abolitionist Future, draws on more than two decades of incarceration to offer both a deeply personal and sharply analytical critique of the U.S. criminal legal system, accompanied by a bold vision for what justice could look like beyond prisons.
And next week, I’ll be releasing a conversation with Felix Rosado, a restorative justice practicer, author, and educator, who was released in 2022 from a life without parole sentence and has gone on to have a tremendous impact in our community by promoting accountability and healing between people who cause criminal harm and those who are impacted by it.
I hope you’ll give Just Justice a listen. And let me know what you think.
From Minnesota to New Jersey, people are joining together with a shared belief that justice must be defended collectively. They stand us a reminder that justice can happen, even in the most difficult times.
In peace and solidarity,
— Jessica
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