A New Crime Bill Won’t Make Us Safer — Investing in Communities Will
By Jasmine L. Tyler
During the recent joint address to Congress, President Trump called for a new crime bill, promising to be “tougher on repeat offenders” and to enhance protections for police. He also reiterated his executive order mandating the death penalty for those convicted of killing police officers. While this rhetoric may play well politically, history — and the evidence — tells us that these policies won’t make our communities safer. Instead, they will deepen the harms of mass incarceration, exacerbate racial disparities, and ignore the real solutions to community safety.
Decades of research and experience have shown us that harsher sentencing laws, including mandatory minimums and habitual offender statutes, do not deter crime. The Justice Policy Institute’s almost thirty years of research demonstrate that punitive responses often fail to address the root causes of crime — poverty, lack of access to mental health care, and systemic disinvestment in communities. When policymakers double down on outdated “tough on crime” strategies, they sidestep the policies that actually work: prevention, rehabilitation, and community-based supports. As JPI has documented in Building a Brighter Future, punitive policies overwhelmingly target communities already burdened by economic and social inequities. Instead of reducing crime, these laws have contributed to an overburdened and racially biased criminal legal system.
A new crime bill centered on harsher penalties for “repeat offenders” risks repeating the mistakes of the 1994 Crime Bill, which fueled mass incarceration, particularly among Black and brown communities. Several prominent elected officials from both parties have since apologized for their role in the passage of the 1994 Crime Bill. Former President Joe Biden acknowledged its contribution to mass incarceration, while former President Bill Clinton admitted the bill had unintended consequences that disproportionately harmed Black and brown communities. Democratic lawmakers like Rep. James Clyburn and Sen. Bernie Sanders have expressed regret over its impact, as have Republicans such as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Sen. Chuck Grassley, who have since supported criminal justice reforms aimed at undoing some of the bill’s harshest provisions.
Moreover, tying crime policy to immigration, as was repeatedly done in the address, is both misleading and dangerous. Crime rates have steadily declined over the past three decades, even as immigration has increased. Studies, including those cited in JPI’s work on community safety, consistently show that immigrants — regardless of legal status — commit crimes at lower rates than native-born citizens. Fear-based narratives scapegoating immigrants serve only to inflame tensions and justify punitive policies rather than advancing evidence-based solutions.
If we truly care about public safety, we have to shift our focus from punishment to prevention. This means investing in education, job training, violence interruption programs, and mental health services — all of which have been proven to reduce crime. JPI’s research in The Right Investment 2.0 on key investments in Maryland demonstrates that misguided spending on incarceration must be redirected, as community programs not only improve public safety but do so at a fraction of the cost.
Policymakers must resist the urge to recycle failed “tough on crime” policies and instead prioritize proven, community-centered approaches. A new crime bill built on punitive sentencing will not prevent harm — it will only entrench the injustices of our criminal legal system and cost taxpayers. If Congress is serious about public safety, they should look to the data, not the rhetoric, and invest in solutions that build safer, stronger communities for all.
