Political Quotes

“Mr. President, today, I am proud to introduce the Justice for All Reauthorization Act of 2010, together with Senator Franken. The Justice for All Act, passed in 2004, was an unprecedented bipartisan piece of criminal justice legislation and the most significant step Congress had taken in many years to improve the quality of justice in this country, and to restore public confidence in the integrity of the American justice system. After several hearings and much work, today we begin in earnest the process of building on that foundation to go still further to ensure our criminal justice system works fairly and effectively for all Americans. In 2000, I introduced the Innocence Protection Act, which aimed to improve the administration of justice by ensuring that defendants in the most serious cases receive competent representation and, where appropriate, access to post-conviction DNA testing necessary to prove their innocence in those cases where the system got it grievously wrong. The Innocence Protection Act became a key component of the Justice for All Act, along with important provisions to ensure that crime victims would have the rights and protections they need and deserve, and that States and communities would take major steps to reduce the backlog of untested rape kits and give prompt justice for victims of sexual assault. These and other important criminal justice provisions made the Justice for All Act a groundbreaking achievement in criminal justice reform.…”