I am running for Cook County State’s Attorney because the office where I once worked needs change.
We need real reform to make our criminal justice system fairer, and keep us safer. The Cook County jail system should be keeping dangerous criminals off our streets, but today it is effectively a debtors’ prison, and one of the nation’s largest drug rehabilitation facilities and mental health care providers.
As State’s Attorney, I am committed to fixing this broken system that locks people up because they are poor, addicted, or mentally ill. I will enact prosecutorial reforms that will put renewed focus towards getting low-level, nonviolent offenders into treatment programs instead of jail, and work to create better relationships between prosecutors and the communities they serve. We will reduce excessive court fees that have for too long punished people for being poor, and functioned as a cash cow for our legal system. And we will step up prosecution of corporate wrongdoing in the civil division to protect consumers, and use the proceeds from settlements in those cases to help fund criminal justice reform efforts, like drug courts, diversion programs, and rehabilitation.