"Let's be smart on crime, because just being tough on crime isn't always the right decision."
Former Utah U.S. Attorney Brett Tolman says new orders from from Trump's Attorney General Jeff Sessions telling federal prosecutors to seek the harshest possible charges ignores decades of criminal justice learning in the U.S.
Among the lessons learned that apparently have escaped Sessions is that warehousing huge numbers of people for long, harsh sentences isn't the most effective way of fighting crime.
And Tolman says the Sessions order tightening the harsh sentence screws for federal crimes will increase the racial inequality in the U.S. criminal justice system.
"While it affects all cross sections of the United States, it has a deeper and a wider effect on our inner cities and our poor and in our minority communities.
It ignores decades of learning that we've done on the issue. We have seen that you cannot prosecute and incarcerate our way our of the drug problem."