Policy Implications with Maritza Perez: The Act of Being Involved

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Podcast Transcript: 

[Intro]

Dia Porter: Hi, my name is Dia Porter. I am an editor for the Georgetown Public Policy Review’s podcast. During the 2020 fall break, I had the pleasure of speaking with Maritza Perez, Director of the Office of National Affairs at the Drug Policy Alliance. We spoke about the current and forthcoming administration, how to keep public momentum and engagement for policy initiatives after milestone wins and navigating how to get people to understand the policy issues you are advocating for.

[Episode Start]

Maritza Perez: My name is Maritza Perez. I’m the Director of the Office of National Affairs at the Drug Policy Alliance. We are based in D.C., we do the federal legislative work for the Drug Policy Alliance. The Drug Policy Alliance, itself, is a non-profit that works to end the war on drugs. I really see our work as two-fold. We’re a criminal justice reform organization—we want to reform laws associated with drug activity; but we’re also a public health organization and we want to ensure that people who use drugs have access to harm-reduction services and treatment, should they want and need it.

Porter: So, how did you get involved in this kind of work? I know that you went to Berkeley for your J.D., to get your law degree, but like kind of what’s your trajectory of getting into drug policy work and criminal justice reform work?

Perez: Well, I was always really interested in civil rights issues generally from a very early age; and part of that was just because, you know, my own family is an immigrant family and I was raised in a very conservative part of America. And just having that experience really showed me from an early age how unjust the world can be and I just remember being angry. Like I just, like it really angered me and led me to want to do civil rights work when I eventually found out what civil rights were, you know. I was like, “Oh, that sounds like a path that would suit me.” But, the more I learned, you know, just like the more I learned about various civil rights issues, the more that I was awakened to what the criminal legal system looks like. And I saw a lot of similarities between the criminal legal system and the immigration system in terms of how they both work to demonize people and detain people. And really both systems ruin lives; so the more I learned about criminal justice, the more I thought, “You know, this might be a path for me.” So, I–you know, ever since law school I’ve been really throwing myself into different criminal justice system projects and my work since law school has been around reforming the criminal justice system. And when a position came open at the Drug Policy Alliance that was focused on dismantling the war on drugs, I thought it would be such a great fit given my work in the criminal justice space already, so that’s how I ended up here.

Porter: And what type of policy work as of late has Drug Policy Alliance been working on or, you know, just yourself throughout your career?

Perez: Yeah, so the Drug Policy Alliance has been very busy since the COVID-19 pandemic hit the U.S. One thing that we warned about was that people who are most vulnerable would be really hurt by the pandemic and we specifically were thinking about people incarcerated and people who use drugs; and I hate to say that we are right. But what we’ve seen is that the pandemic has really affected imprisoned populations, who are more likely to be infected with the virus; and that’s simply because if you think about a correctional facility, it’s impossible to follow the CDC guidance around COVID-19 in that type of setting. It’s just impossible, you can’t socially distance. You probably don’t have access to cleaning supplies. You probably can’t wear a mask. You probably can’t wash your hands as often as you’d like. And this virus is airborne and you’re with people, around people all the time. And you’re also dealing with guards who come in and out of the facility all the time. So, what we’ve seen is that, you know, jails and prisons have been hit really hard, as well as immigrant detention centers.

So, we’ve been working really hard to call for depopulating jails, prisons and immigrant detention centers in light of the pandemic. And we’ve done that in a few ways, but it’s mostly been by asking Congress to include measures for decarceration in COVID relief. But obviously there’s been a lot of problems with that for a couple of reasons. One, it’s really hard to get people to care about these populations, we always face that within our work. But then two, Congress is really really broken and they, even in the midst of a pandemic—when you think that would bring them together and at least that would be incentive enough to get them to negotiate, that hasn’t been the case. The House Democrats passed a COVID package, have passed several COVID packages. The Senate Republicans have not and they’re not the best negotiators. So, we’re in this position where nobody is getting relief. We got like a, you know, one-time relief; but as far as like relief for incarcerated populations, it just hasn’t been there.

And another thing that we’ve been pushing for is more funding for harm-reduction services and treatment for people who use drugs. The conditions of quarantine, and really just the pandemic, have accelerated the opioid overdose crisis. We’ve seen overdose numbers go up exponentially and that’s for several reasons, including the fact that people who use drugs are at home now; they’re isolated; they may be suffering from, you know, anxiety, like we all are; mental health issues that could exasperate things like addiction. And then, you know, we also have the fact that people can’t go to their trusted drug seller, whether it be a pharmacy or their friend, they’re under strict lockdown condition so it’s been harder for them to get drugs that they know are safe to use. So we’ve been pushing for that as well. But similar barrier where Congress has been fighting us along the way and they can’t even negotiate on a COVID package. So, we’re pushing for these things, but they’ve been really hard to get incorporated into any final bill because Congress just hasn’t come up with a final bill.

We also, this summer when there was a lot of energy behind police reform, we jumped on that as a part of our work is police reform as well. So, we worked with the House Democrats on the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, to make sure that it included a couple of things that we’ve always advocated for, including ending the militarization of police by abolishing programs like the Department of Defense 1033 program, which allows military equipment from the State Department or—excuse me—from the Department of Defense, to go to local police who end up using it against their own civilian populations, including in protests like we saw with the Mike Brown protests in Ferguson, Missouri. So included that, and then we also pushed to end “no knock” and “quick knock” warrants. So, a “no knock” warrant is the type of warrant that was used in the killing of Breonna Taylor. It’s a judicial warrant where the police are allowed to go to a person’s home and either not give notice that they’re there or a “quick knock” warrant would be where they give fast notice, but then then they still come in anyway. We are trying to eliminate both types, “no knocks” and “quick knocks”; we did get “no knocks” eliminated, we did not get “quick knocks” eliminated. So, our plan for the next Congress is to reintroduce the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act with changes, including totally eliminating the 1033 program and totally eliminating “no knock” and “quick knock” policing mechanisms. Because, as we saw with, you know, the case of Breonna Taylor, as we’ve seen with many cases, it can have really deadly outcomes for individuals. Yeah, and not just for like civilians; but, like a lot of police get killed in those because, you know, what do you expect, you’re like barging into people’s homes, people are scared they’re going to react and protect their space.

And then, our last bit of work that I’ll share is we’ve been working on a really, a far-reaching marijuana legalization bill called the MORE Act, the Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement Act, H.R. 3884. We’ve been working on this bill, well I started working on this bill before I even got to the Drug Policy Alliance. I’ve been part of the coalition that put the bill together and has been advocating for it for a couple years now. But, when I got to the Drug Policy Alliance, I started to lead the coalition that put the bill together. And this bill would deschedule marijuana. In addition to descheduling marijuana, it would tax the marijuana industry at a very modest rate in order to fund social justice programs, including a community reinvestment fund that would reinvest tax dollars into communities most harmed by the war on drugs for things like expungement services, substance use disorder treatment, job training, mentorship programs—that sort of thing—reentry services.

And then the two other funding streams are for the Small Business Administration. One funding stream would go to support underrepresented people who are joining the marijuana industry to ensure that they have the money they need to succeed; but also, that they have the technical assistance they need to enter and succeed in the industry. What we know about the marijuana industry is that even though Black and brown people continue to bear the brunt of enforcement, we are not the people who are the industry owners. The industry is super white male—incredibly white male—which is just completely unjust when you think about who continues, and who has always, borne the brunt of marijuana prohibition in this country. So, you know, we aim to fix that with the MORE Act.

And then the third program is another Small Business Administration program that would give jurisdictions funding so that they can implement their own equitable licensing programs. So, we want them to include specifically people who have conviction records for marijuana use or possession, just to make sure that those folks are included. Because, what we’ve seen in states that have legalized is that they have left out people with convictions; which is just kind of crazy because, like we all know that if you don’t have a job that’s, you know, another factor, they could lead somebody back to jail or prison. For a lot of people that’s how they made their income, that’s how they fed their family; so, it just doesn’t make sense to exclude them, we want them to be part of the regulated market. It just makes sense.

So, that’s the social justice piece; but we also address different aspects of marijuana law. For example, we also prohibit the denial of federal benefits for marijuana user activity; so no longer will somebody’s federal housing or benefits—like SNAP, TANF—be denied because of marijuana user conviction. And then we also bar non-citizens from being deported or having their immigration status put in jeopardy because of marijuana activity. Because what happens a lot of times, especially in states where marijuana is legal, non-citizens will use marijuana in compliance with a state law not realizing that, because it’s a Schedule I drug, there are immigration consequences. And this extends to even people who work in the legal marijuana industry; they may not know that they can’t do that. Like, it might be perfectly legal in your state but, because marijuana is a federally scheduled drug, you can’t ever get your citizenship basically; so, like this would fix that. So, it’s a pretty comprehensive bill, we’re really excited about it. It’s going to be voted on in the House next week actually so, you know, hopefully, less than a week from now it’ll have been passed through the House. So, that’s really exciting for us.

Porter: There’s a couple of things that you mentioned that I kind of want to circle back on. One of which being, how our prisons are very similar to our immigration centers. And—just from like a historical perspective—if you could just briefly kind of touch on the criminalization of immigration in this country and just what that looks like?

Perez: Yeah, that’s a really good question. So, I think what a lot of people probably don’t realize is that the first private prisons in this country were actually created to house non-citizens. This movement really, like, started in the 80s. We really went from a country who has never been kind to immigrants, in my opinion, to one that just started to demonize and criminalize immigrants to an extent we hadn’t seen in the past. Yes, the racial bias is, you know, phobia—I think has always been there for different populations; but that’s when we really saw a government effort to like criminalize and incarcerate immigrant populations. And that started by the government and working with private prison companies to create different detention centers across the country and that has exploded. About half of all immigrant detention centers today are, you know, privately run and that’s an issue because it’s really hard to get information from privately run facilities. Like with a publicly run facility, you can ask questions, like, you can FOIA different information. There’s like a level of transparency there and in addition to that, I just think that it’s messed up that somebody can profit from that dehumanizing aspect of incarcerating people. We should never incentivize people; there shouldn’t be a profit motive behind that, like it’s just really messed up. So, yeah I mean so that you know the 80s, we started to see mass criminalization when these private prison companies move in. And then—in the late 80s, 90s—we actually started to see Congress pass laws supported by the President, both Democrats and Republicans that criminalized migration. That, you know, made it a crime to cross the border without documents basically. I can go into a million reasons why that’s a problem, but, you know, I guess, like, for us, like the biggest thing is that now we have a huge system that mirrors the criminal justice system. That is just as punitive. That detains people. That is responsible for literally hundreds of deaths every year. Where there’s little accountability. It’s even more problematic—in some ways—in the immigration system, I think; like the whole system. Because non-citizens don’t have the rights that citizens do, non-citizens aren’t as protected under the Constitution as citizens are. They don’t have many of the rights that you and I have, and I think that that just makes it harder to abolish system and to open it up and see what’s really happening and protect those people. So yeah, it’s a well oiled machine and, unfortunately, even in the next administration—and the one after that—I don’t know if we’ll see immigration relief anytime soon.

Porter: How does that impact the policy process? Like, if you’re submitting a policy memo or policy documentation, does that kind of go on pause during this period of, kind of, transition between presidents, or how does that impact the work? And then also, when you’re shifting from a Republican administration to a Democratic administration, you know, I feel like this year in particular has shown a lot of people that, you know, it’s not as easy as “good” and “bad” when it comes to Democrat and Republican. It’s a gray area, so each side has their positives and negatives. But, what does the shift in administration—is that, seen as like a win for you all? Does it not really impact the work you’re doing? Like, how do the politics of it all come into policy work?

Perez: Yeah, so you know we think with any new administration presents a new opportunity and new challenges. Definitely, there has been nothing like the Trump administration in my time as a professional, like a working professional in this space. Like, that was just completely, utterly terrible. I—my first president was President Obama, that was like the first president I voted for. And, you know, I was used to that; and then you have like Trump, who was like the complete opposite in every way. So that was, you know—and at the time I was also working at a Latino civil rights organization; so I felt like everyday was like terrible and a different fire.

So, I think we—I don’t want to speak for everybody, but at least, you know, advocates I think feel a sense of relief that we’re back to like a somewhat “normal”—I mean a “normal” administration compared to what we’ve been facing. Yeah, so I think it will make our jobs easier, but like you said it’s more complicated than that. You know, at the Drug Policy Alliance we have been working on transition documents for the next administration. We created a transition document sometime this fall and that was assuming—well, that was before we knew who the administration would be. We had no idea, we just wrote like a laundry list of things we’d like the next administration to do. When we found out it was Biden, we repurposed that transition document, narrowed down our asks and we released it.

And, one thing we realized, that when we were making that transition document, is that a lot of the things we’re asking for would have to be done through executive action or through Biden using his executive powers. And that’s because the make of this Congress is still kind of up in the air, but it’s very likely it’ll be a divided Congress. The House has a very thin majority, very thin democratic majority. They lost some states. And then the Senate, you know, that’s still up in the air with the run-off in Georgia. Now, if we win the two Senate races  Georgia—if the Democrats win the two Senate races in Georgia, we will have a tied Senate with like 50 Democrats, 50 Republicans; then, Vice President Harris would be the tie-breaker, Chuck Schumer would be the Senate majority leader, so things would be better for us.

But, I mean, you’re talking about a really, closely—you know, a slim majority in the House plus no majority in the Senate; that would mean that we would have to compromise on our work a lot more. But, that’s probably not even going to happen. I don’t even think we will win both Georgia races. I think Mitch McConnell will continue to led the Republican Senate, the Republican-majority Senate and that’ll make our work really, really difficult because we won’t be able to pass anything really progressive though the entire Congress. Mitch McConnell only cares about judges and helping out corporations, and Trump will no longer be in office, so he’ll have no more judges to confirm; so he’s going to focus on helping out corporations, and that’s going to be his priorities. Our work is just probably not going to move in the Senate, which is really sad.

And then we face another challenge with Biden because, you know, Biden is a “tough on crime” lawmaker who hates drugs and he still has a really old-school, backwards mindset when it comes to drug use. Like, he’s out here talking about, “no one should go to jail for drug use,  but they should be forced to go into treatment.” That doesn’t even make sense. Yes, its true, nobody should be incarcerated for drug activity; but, nobody should be forced, coerced into mandated treatment, that’s another form of being under the system. It’s another form of incarceration. He presents a problem, at least on our issues. I’m sure, you know, he’s going to be great on other progressive things, but on criminal justice, it is going to be tough. We just have, like, a tough four years.

Porter: When it was finally announced—after, you know, it seems like 10-years of waiting to see who the president would be—I was definitely not in that group of folks who overjoyed, rejoiced. I kind of definitely took it as a, “Okay. We still have work to do.” But, and for me, I definitely have been on the front lines out protesting with different organizations in D.C. and we’ve definitely seen less focus on some of the issues we had been calling for ever since Biden was announced as president. And it seems as though, you know, a lot of folks just thought that that was the fight—to get Trump out—and it’s so much bigger than that. And so we’re kind of at a point now where we’re trying to essentially, you know, rally back our allies and our numbers to get people to see, okay, well once Biden is inaugurated officially in and becomes our official President, like, what are our next steps. And it seems as though, when it comes to policy work that’s something you also have to keep in mind, because it’s not as simple as a, “Okay, well Biden’s President now so he’s going to approve this MORE Act because he’s a Democrat and Democrats are “for the people”, like, that’s just not as simple as it is. So, it kind of—like, what are techniques that you all use in the policy space to rally Congress members and Senate members who have to vote and approve these policies?

Perez: Well, it takes a lot of education. Congress always is—I’ve always said this, Congress is always a few steps behind where the public is. It always helps to have the public support a policy issue and to see, to see it actually happen in different states and localities. Like, when Congress sees progressive things happen and then they see that the sky didn’t fall out, and that it was actually good, I think that’s when they get a little bolder. But, for all of our work, it just requires a lot of education. With the MORE Act, for example, it’s been just a ton of education. You know, lobby meetings with members of Congress doesn’t just mean that you’re trying to convince them to support a bill; lobby meetings usually start off by just educating them, like basic education on the issue. Educating their staff, answering a ton of questions about the issue and why it’s a problem, explaining that. But that takes a ton of time. It’s a ton of contact. It’s a ton of meetings. It always helps to have a coalition behind you of various stakeholders that are saying the same thing—maybe from a different perspective. And then, you know, we always like to engage the public in what we do. They like to hear from constituents, so we always tell our constituent, “contact to member about this or that…” So it takes all of that. But it’s—it’s mostly a lot of education and then the public pressure later, but always education. I feel like education is like 80% of the work.

Porter: Yeah, and I think that can be said for just much of trying to revise the quote-unquote “system”, as we call it, is truly just education. People don’t know what they don’t know or they choose not to know what they should know. So it’s just a lot of ignorance to, I guess, the experiences of others and really walking in someone else’s shoes and really seeing like, “oh, this is bad”; so, like I wasn’t aware of the history of lynching within this country from a Latinx community perspective. When I think of lynchings—as Black woman—you know, I think of my history and what that looks like. So it was very, very insightful for me to gain a bit more knowledge on how the system impacts the Latinx community; because whenever you’re looking at these statistics its like oh, you know, “80% of the Black and Latinx community is impacted by…”—this is a made up statistic. But, I can definitely say that I don’t—when I am doing my research or doing my reading—I am not really focusing as much on the Latinx community, because I am a Black woman. But, I’ve definitely started to want to learn more and now I can relate more to that community. So I think, outside of the knowledge, it’s really, how do you convince people to put their ego aside and really care about other people. And that is such a hard fight, because at the end of the day human-nature is selfishness, unfortunately. So, to go back to speaking a bit more about COVID and how its impacted our jails and just from an eight amendment perspective of “cruel and unusual punishment” and, just one starting of kind of getting your individual view point on whether or not COVID and the pandemic is viewed as “cruel and unusual punishment” for our incarcerated population?

Perez: I think people who are close to the issue would say that. But, I feel like at large that’s not a belief. Just because, I feel like incarcerated settings are atrocious on a normal day and a very small population is constantly talking about this. A lot of people, unfortunately, have the mentality that if you’re in the criminal justice system, you deserve the treatment that you are getting, which is really messed up. So you’d think that something like a pandemic would wake people up to what’s actually happening inside these facilities, but it’s been really hard to get people’s—to get people to care and pay attention.

Porter: And I guess it’s really not even that COVID is “cruel and unusual punishment”, its one incarceration, to extents, is “cruel and unusual punishment”. But also, just the—the healthcare system within prisons is lacking tremendously. I looked at our health care system, and I know how flawed it is, and how—causing of deep sighs it is, honestly. And then you have to look at other populations, like our immigrant populations, people who really just are not given their due voice in America. And when you look at how our system, our health care system, our criminal justice system, etcetera, etcetera impacts those populations it’s—it’s really just sickening. Like, we do not treat people as people. We have a very dehumanizing system broadly and it’s—it’s very hard for me to see people who don’t see how dehumanizing it is. Like, it’s right in front of your face. So I really struggle with how someone could just not put “A” and “B” together and see, like, “oh, this is wrong“. And so, I guess from a policy standpoint, how do you, kind of, deal with that internal conflict as you’re trying to keep your work moving and really make change?

Perez: You mean like getting people to actually see what’s happening?

Porter: Yeah, and like is that your duty as a policy maker?

Perez: I think so. And I think part of that is just to make sure that people who are directly impacted by the work or the issue you are advocating for are included in the policymaking; and not just in the policy solutions, but in advocacy. I think that’s incredibly important, because, one they’re closest to the issue, so we want them to be included. But also, I think that’s what changes hearts and minds is when people meet somebody who is directly impacted. I really saw this first happening with the immigrant rights movement, you saw all of these Dreamers and DACA recipients coming out and saying “I’m undocumented and afraid; let me tell you my experience”, and then people started to realize, oh like this undocumented population isn’t like a scary population. It’s not like this menacing figure I have in my head. It’s my neighbor. It’s my student. It’s my nurse. People that we see in our neighborhoods. And I think that did get a lot of sympathy for the movement, at least for Dreamers.

And then you saw the same thing happen, pretty recently, with people who have been formally incarcerated coming out and telling their stories, sharing their experiences and advocating for freeing other people. I think that’s been really helpful, because once again it puts a face to the issue; and I think that always goes a long way with convincing the public, but also with lawmakers. I think it’s just really important to always center directly impacted people for those reasons. It’s like, it’s a winning strategy; but also it’s just the right thing to do, because they’re the ones who are closest to the issue and should partake in the solution.

Porter: I’ve been working with a couple of organizations to try to get justice for young, Black males who have been murdered as of late in my city and we have definitely found that working with the communities, I can definitely say, it’s had a notable impact in comparison to some other demonstrations, we had earlier in the summer of this year. So, I think that having that true face and person and story that you can attach to it…

Perez: Helps.

Porter: Is there anything else from a policy perspective, Drug Policy Alliance, just your work as an attorney that you feel is noteworthy to mention for public policy students and/or just the general public who might be wanting to get a bit more involved in this space or just get a bit more knowledge on their own?

Perez: Yeah, I think I would say that even in a new administration, with a new head in the White House, people should remain politically engaged. Fortunately, politics isn’t like a thing that happens every four years, it’s ongoing. I think it’s just really important to always pay attention to current affairs, the world around us, how our government is functioning; we live in a democracy, that means that we should be active participants in what happens. When we don’t pay attention, that’s when people who are only interested in power, make terrible decisions. And, if we’re not watching it’s easier for them to do that. So, getting Trump out of office, I think a lot of people will feel really relieved and it’s a huge victory, but that doesn’t mean that the work ends. We have so much work to do. We have to hold the new administration accountable. Congress is another issue, like they’re just a mess. So, we just have to keep paying attention and unfortunately, like even what you talked about, having a new administration doesn’t change a lot of issues. Policing is still going to be—that’s like, tale as old as time in this country; the murder of Black people, specifically, at the hands of police has always happened and no matter who’s in charge that’s ongoing. Things like that, you know, there are issues that are going to be just—stuff is always going to keep happening. We have to keep paying attention and keep pushing for change because a new government doesn’t necessarily change everything.

Porter: Yeah. This is a system change and it’s just going to take time and, like you said, educating people. One of the big reasons that I really got involved in policy work is it really does sometimes come down to a lack of knowledge and a lot of access to resources and knowledge in some communities. For example, you were mentioning earlier when we were speaking about the MORE Act, like how some individuals, you know, you might not realize that you’re working in violation of your immigration status or what have you. And it’s like you just don’t know because you just really don’t know; and it’s very hard to—as a civilian—be aware of what all of your rights are, at all times. So it’s like, how do you create a system or a resource or some sort of centralized hub that allows me, the everyday civilian, to kind of just really just, you know—we need Google for rights basically. So you can just really know like what is available to you as far as state or federal subsidy programs, or just resource of that sort. Also, you know, what are my rights if I am pulled over by a cop or things of that sort. Because like you really just don’t know and it’s impossible for you to know everything as a citizen. So, where does that responsibility and that burden of education lie? Is that on me as a civilian? Is that something that my government should be providing to me? Is that when the school system comes in? And these are things that we need to be educating our students so that they are fully aware. At what point in the system does that education need to come or is it truly all just something you have to self-start, and you have to seek out as an individual?

Perez: I think it’s all of it. We need a better education system generally; just in our schools, our public education system lies to us and isn’t very truthful about our history, but also like our present. We’re just not very educated on civics or history in this country; our government should also be doing a better job with that. But it’s also on us to just stay politically engaged. I think, you know, people should just stay on top of it. We can’t stay on top of everything and people want different networks, and I think some networks might make it easier to get information that others; but, it’s a combination of all of those things. We need to improve public education and government education, but we also need to stay up to date on what’s happening.

[Episode end]

[Episode recap start]

Porter: Since recording this podcast episode Democrats have gain control of the White House, flipped the Senate and maintained the House majority. The House-approved Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement, or MORE, Act is headed to the Senate for consideration. We patiently wait to see how the new administration will address drug and criminal justice policy reform.

Thank you for listening to the Georgetown Public Policy Review podcast, I hope you enjoyed our conversation. If you enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and check out more from Georgetown Public Policy Review at gppreview.com.