YouSaid · the spoken record

Mark Holden

lines on the record: 61
first: 2015-11-09
most recent: 2015-11-09
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“You understand viscerally and emotionally when you see some of these awful crimes why people react that way. But I think the discussion is going on now and I hope it continues. At the end of the day, I really believe that a lot of people in this country, most people in this country, all people in this country want to do the right thing and will get to the right place when they're faced with the right facts and the right arguments. So we'll see how that plays out.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I'm not talking I worry about the death penalty for sure. I mean, personally, I'm not a fan of it. I think that we're starting to see a change in this country. I think that it's going to have to be state by state. I think that at the same time, again, going back to the Bill of Rights, some read the Eighth Amendment is allowing for it, and it did. But yeah, I think that just what you pointed out about the error in our criminal justice system, just it's fraught with error. They think there are 10% at least of the people incarcerated or innocent, that would give me great concerns. And I think the data shows that it actually is more expensive to put someone to death than it is life imprisonment. At the same time,”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I'm hopeful that if we had some success in a bipartisan way on an issue that has been as difficult as criminal justice in our country, I mean, no one ever lost an election being tough on crime. But now we're looking both sides saying, let's rethink this. Let's be smarter on crime. And that's what's happening. Maybe this will give us the ability to work on other issues together. I worry, though, that we are so two-year, four-year, whatever, six-year motivated, and it's all about going back to my district and talking to people who already agree with me so I can raise more money and get more power.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I totally agree. And I think I'm in no way am I ever be confused with an optimist, but this has given me some hope working with people who we haven't been able to work with that, you know, maybe we're not all, I don't think you're El I didn't think that to begin with. A lot of people have thought we are. We're not. Maybe you now understand we have some ideas that are good. Let's find more good things to work on. I mean, I remember growing up and it was a different age, obviously. You know, Teddy Kennedy and Orren Hatch are like best buddies, right? And they got stuff done. Tip O'Neill and Reagan. You hear all this stuff. All I'm saying is we are so focused in this country. It's so partisan. We're all in our corners all the time. And we're always talking at each other. We're tweeting this. We're tweeting that. We want to win the moment, the soundbite, whatever it is. Let's sit down and find things we agree on. But I don't think our current system is set up that way for whatever reason.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, exactly. Right. Was she used for Massachusetts? But no, it's a two-tier society. We just disagree on what caused it and what the fix is. But I think we need to address that. And I think part of that is what we're talking about here today.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think that it's more difficult for some people. I do think that some of the things we've been talking about from the federal government perspective, like the criminal justice system being reformed, would be great. I think we should, one of our Charles' other key elements would save trillions of dollars is ending all corporate welfare, getting rid of every bit of it, subsidies, tax credits, everything else. Start to free up money that way, start to have people believe more in the system. I mean, we have a two-tier system. We have a two-tier society. I mean, you heard Elizabeth Warren say that? We think that too. But we disagree on why you guys are always a good.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“What people in the South Side or people in Wichita, poor people that I grew up with in Worcester, wherever it is, what they deal with on a daily basis if you're a kid around that, it's devastating. So, I wish you could be corrected, but I think at the end of the day, what we need to do as a society is not be so stratified. We need to be more open. We need to be more forgiving. We need to be less judgy, particularly of people who have had problems and fallen down. We need to help pick them up because it goes back to Brian Stevenson, one of my favorite quotes he has, is each of us is more than the worst thing we've ever done. And I got to tell you, and I'm not just saying this, I said at the beginning we're kind of coming near the end maybe. When I think back now, what the things I did and what I could have ended up, what could have happened, particularly these days with social media and everything else, I'm a very lucky person. And I think everybody in this country needs to realize that, that they could be very much on the other side of things, victims of circumstances. So open up their hearts and minds.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think what we need to do, I mean, part of it is you can't legislate it. I mean, every child should be loved and every child especially. You can't do that, and that's not a rich report thing because there's messes on every side of that or failures. I think, though, if you look at what some of the programs that have worked really well in the juvenile justice system, particularly one in Missouri, it basically is a situation where they're trying to now replicate what should have happened in the home. I mean, what should have happened when they were kids? Everyone wants to succeed. Everyone wants to be loved. Everyone wants to be accepted. If we could do that, if we could legislate that, that would be great. We can't. So after that, we're trying to play catch-up through whatever the community or social services. I don't know what to say. I grew up in Worcester Mass, which was a great place. I grew up at a time when I went to the University of Massachusetts and I did, my parents told me if I worked hard, followed the rules, did the right thing, went to school, did all that stuff, went to mass every day. I could be successful in this country. I'd like to think that's still the case. I know I have no way to understand.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“They're not common people either, but they have a lot of groups they support that are like moveon.org. Is that common people? I don't know. I guess what I'm saying, David, is both sides do it. We maybe both complain about it. But I think it's overall, it's positive to have as many viewpoints and voices out there, and there are a lot of points of views. And while we get every, you know, I get enough Google alerts, I see what we get blamed for. It's the Ben Franklin thing, believe none of what you hear and half of what you see. And I think that we should be encouraging more voices, more people out there, regardless of what it is and not less. And we play a role in that, and a lot of other people and individuals do as well. And I think that's a healthy thing for our...”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“and let an individual decide what to do with their own money, their own neighborhoods, their own lives, and less government intrusion. Government is way too intrusive, way too overreaching. So that's what we use our voice for. Now, is that good, bad, or indifferent? I don't know. I think throughout history there's been a lot of different people have different views. And the thing I love about our country is you get to say it. You don't have to like it. But the cure for speech, you either don't like or don't agree with is more speech. It's not less speech. And I think that common people do have a voice. I know the Democracy Alliance has about 182 groups, which is the counterpart to what we do.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, well, whatever. I mean, I don't know if I wouldn't want to trade places with anybody. But all I'm saying is that the things we believe in, if we were as powerful as you say and as persuasive as you say and had this control, then why when the extenders bill last year, we had like 30 people who we supported voted against that because it was a lot of pork and a lot of cronyism. Most everybody still does the same thing. We don't have that kind of power. I'm not saying we don't have any. I think that most politicians are going to do their own thing. And at the end of the day, we try to be engaged in the political process so we can get the ideas we think are important passed through and implemented to the extent there's will for it, the political will that the elected officials have to have. But the things that we care about, like overspending, cronyism, the criminal justice system reform issues, there's a common thread. It's about individual.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I see this some want to set up the campaign finance system is really going to be ultimately the incumbent protection act forever. It's like the Udall Amendment last year where they tried to amend the Constitution to limit the ability for certain activities to happen during an electoral season. I don't think we should do that. I hear what you're saying. There's all this concern about we have an outsized voice. We have this, we have that. Well, I guess I disagree. We do certain things. I'll trade plays.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I don't think so. I think our point of view is again both sides do it and everybody has a right to free speech. We have grassroots groups like Americans for Prosperity. They get branded certain ways or targeted certain ways. Tim Phillips has been here.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“The last eight, nine months, now ten months this year, talking about in my capacity as Coke Industries, meeting with legislators, the only time I've ever lobbied in my life has been this year on criminal justice reform. That's First Amendment activity. So we have those rights. I think that what is lost really at the end of the day is that money has been seen as speech in our political process for a long time going back at least to Buckley versus Vallejo, where William Brennan, who was no conservative, was in the majority on that case. And so that's what we're talking about money is speech. And there's also anonymous speech is recognized by the First Amendment. So I see it as all consistent and part of what's been going on in this country for a long time.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“which is that there was a video put out by this group called Citizens United that was critical of then candidate Hillary Clinton in two thousand eight and because of the McCain Fingold campaign finance law, you could not have a video out within sixty days or thirty days of the general election or primary election. And so they were prohibited from putting that video out on direct for video, direct for whatever it is. They sued, saying we have a First Amendment right to do this. The lower court said, no, no, you don't. And in fact, it could be criminal under McCain Feingold. That went to the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court, five to four, ruled that that law is unconstitutional. You can't censor that. That's core political speech. And I think that that was the holding of that case. It gets conflated and misrepresented in my opinion. But corporations have free speech rights, First Amendment rights. I could not have been out doing what I've done.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, you're not. No, no, seriously. I wasn't just saying that fill your boots up or whatever they say in the Midwest. But my point is, going back to the beginning, politics has always been really nasty and really expensive, in my opinion, from what I've read and understood. And I think that what we've seen over time is there's always been a ton of money in politics. There really has on both sides, depending on who's giving it. Citizens United, that is seen as some watershed event, and I get why that is said, but at its core, we know what that case is about.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But David's philanthropy in New York is very visible. Let's talk about this because you obviously are much more knowledgeable for sure on history and politics and everything else.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That's a question we could debate, I guess, for sure. I think it's a First Amendment issue. And first, let me just be clear. A lot of, particularly Charles' money, goes to education and other things besides politics.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“He got all three sentences within one case, which wasn't intended by the statute, but it was interpreted that way, and the prosecutor had the discretion the judge didn't. The judge was a George W. Bush appointee named Cassell. He's now resigned from the bench, retired from the bench. At sentencing, he said, this is outrageous, it's unfair, it's cruel. If he was a terrorist as a first time defender, let's say he hijacked a plane, he would have got twenty four years maximum. If he had killed someone, manslaughter on Federal Indian lands, he would have got ten years maximum. If he had raped a ten-year-old child, he would have got eleven years maximum, which would have been less all those three combined, less than the 55 years he got. So that's going to be changed as well. There's a lot of people in prison because of these statutes that are vaguely interpreted, and it all goes in favor of the prosecutor. So that'll get fixed as well. And going forward, people who commit crimes with guns, they should be held accountable for sure, no doubt. But I don't know that they need 50.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Mandatory minimum for gun violence, for gun crimes, a recidivist statute that says if you have an illegal gun when you commit a federal crime, you get a five-year mandatory minimum. Then you get out of prison. The next time you do it again, 25, and if you ever do it again, 25, well, they charge it all as one”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I'm sorry. Weldon Angelos is a first time offender. He sold marijuana three separate times to an undercover informant. They found an illegal gun on him. He was prosecuted because of a mandatory minimum sentence that the judge could not deviate from, he got fifty five years imprisoned. No one died, no one was shot three times under a thousand dollars worth of marijuana, and the reason was there's this going to get a little inside baseball here, but 924C, a gun stacking man.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And so, what I'm saying is a lot of these different programs, there will be government funding, but I think that for the reentry issues, that type of thing, and then keeping kids out of the system to begin with, there can be private public partnerships. There are a lot of nonprofits. I know in Wichita, Kansas that do a lot of work like that. It's going to be all of us being involved. I mean, that is why this issue, when people get educated on it, pretty much everybody agrees. They're shocked at some of the sentences. They're shocked at some of the outcomes. They're shocked at the amount of money we're spending. It's shocking all around. In this country, someone gets 55 years in prison.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I'm not disagreeing with you. Well, that's no fun. Well, I was going to say the criminal justice system is a place where we need to really reduce the size of government and the overreach. I think education, yeah, that's something the government should be involved in. But I don't know it makes sense for a central government to dictate back to the states.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Really get treatment, help, that type of thing, and all these other problems could be dealt with, but it must start with shrinking the size of the gun”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So, yeah, the government needs to do a certain thing to loosen some of the constraints. But then I think that'll hopefully free up resources that we can direct towards helping people”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Know that'll help with this. But to your point, at the end of the day, all these things are going to take more than the government. The government can't do this. The government can release some of these constraints, and it's going to be up to the communities. It's going to be up to private employers like Coke. We've banned the box. We hope other companies do. It's going to take all of us. This gets back to the proximity thing. And you have to, people, let me just put it this way. I think that if most people knew what was going on in our criminal justice system, the types of people who are getting sent away and just the abject poverty and just what a devastating consequences it's had in this society. We're too isolated as a society. And I think it's based on class more than anything else. But if people understood it, I think they'd opened their hearts and minds. I know in Wichita, Kansas, people have talked to many, many different groups about these issues now. And there's a powerful, powerful sense of redemption in all communities, left, right, and everything else.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, there are. I mean, I think that there's a lot of social services out there already. There's a lot of nonprofit groups working on it. There's a lot of community-based organizations that work on it. And I think that should continue. I do think, look, there's a reason why when this country started, whenever it was 1790 or so, there were three federal crimes enumerated in the Constitution, treason, counterfeiting, and piracy. And everything else was left to the states. And now if you look at the drug wars, the reality is if you believe in federalism, if you believe in a limited federal government and the states have more power at the local level, let them make the decisions. Really, the federal drug program is the most egregious example of over-federalization. You have too many drug laws that are duplicative and lead to all these outcomes. So I think that if we start shrinking the size of our criminal justice system and the number of laws out there, again, there's 5,000 federal criminal laws right now we think we don't know.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But here's the deal. Here's the deal. I mean, you have to play in politics in this country if you want to get anything done. We're more about ideas. Charles in particular is about ideas, free society. And at the core of this issue is about freedom, liberty opportunity, et cetera. Prosperity for individuals. And we think that there's so much money wasted. I think we can all agree on that in our federal government in a lot of different ways. And so to the extent you can shrink the size of this one government program, i.e. incarceration in the criminal justice system, that will free up resources for other things.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, I don't know if we're at war with ourselves, and we try to think of ourselves as non-political in a sense. If you are out there,”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“In prison, right. So the point is, and these are a lot of them are deep red states. So it shouldn't be that controversial. It's a good start. I think usually the states follow the Feds lead on this, but now the federal government's following the states.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It's very really rare now. Now, that's changing too. Last piece on the bill that's good is juvenile justice reform, which is something Senator Booker pushed for, and we've been working with Senator Booker. I think he's phenomenal, by the way. And it basically will provide for no more very limited circumstances for juvenile solitary confinement and also expungement and sealing of juvenile records, which will be a good start. But to your point, yeah, the recidivism rates nationally, it's what, 50-60% within two years. That's why we need to do more. And the good news here is the Senate bill, it really shouldn't even be controversial, in my opinion, because since 2008 or so, 2005 around that time period, 30 states have enacted criminal justice reform, and every one of them has seen a drop in crime, a drop in incarceration rates, and a drop in spending.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, then be out of the system, won't go into the system to begin with or get a second chance or get rehab or get something else, and they can have a positive path through life. So you're going to stop the inflow. People who are already in prison, what it will do for them, the corrections reform part of it, you can get earned time credits for doing the right thing in prison. Like if you have a drug problem or some other issue, you work on that, you get vocational training, you get educational training, that type of thing. You'll get earned time credits to reduce your sentence. So the whole idea is if you're in prison, if we've put someone in prison, hopefully they're going to come out a better person than they went in. That should be the goal.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Eradicate some of that. Well, I think what it's going to do is it's been going one way for a really long time, a real long time. It's been going one way. Okay. So we've had just lock them up, throw away the key, which has been a bipartisan effort between Reagan, Bush, and then Clinton, Biden, Hillary Clinton was on board. All of them were. So now this stops that for a little bit. And hopefully...”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And a lot of our communities. And a lot of it has to do with addictions are serious. It's a serious illness, disease, and there's also the lack of opportunity and all these other things that become criminals because of it. We probably need to think about better things, better ideas, and just putting people in prison for a long time. Now, it's different if it's a drug cartel leader, which will still happen under the new bill. The new bill, the Senate bill deals with low-level offenders. But one thing in particular, I think we prosecute cases based on the weight of drugs. So, you know, like there's a kid in Texas a couple years ago or recently that had made a batch of hashish brownies, and it was like he was facing 60 years in prison because it was a whole thing of brownies. So it's the quantity, how much it weighs total. It isn't necessarily the amount of what your intent is or anything else. And so people who are low level mules who are addicted to do certain things get prosecuted as heavily. And you've had others.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“What should we do? I think that this is what I was going to say when I was talking about we all came together. It would be great to work on other issues besides this. I think that what's happening now is the criminal justice system is the way station. It's where we put everything that's failed before it. We don't have good schools. We don't have opportunity. There's no jobs, that type of thing, right? There's been breakdowns in these communities. And we haven't dealt with any of that. And instead of dealing with it, now we have police in the school. We have more, 10 times the number of mentally ill people in prison than there are mental institutions. I think we need to deal with a whole lot of things. And to me, the drug laws, they don't make sense for a lot of different reasons. I'm not saying legalize everything. I'm not saying I think heroin's a good thing. It isn't. But here's my point of view.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Just ask you as a. Yeah, no, let me tell you my point of view. I think that I believe in the Bill of Rights. I believe in the Constitution. And I think that we should let judges do their jobs. And yeah, there was a violent crime wave, but there's a way to deal with it without giving prosecutors all the power. Do you think the drug law?”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, yeah, the Senate bill, it's called the Sentencing Reform and Corrections Act, and it is truly bipartisan, so you have grassley and cornin, and you have Leahy, Durban, White House, Senator Booker's on board, Mike Lee, etc. And the bill would give judges discretion, increase the safety valve, as they call it, for low level drug offenders, street level and lower. So judges would have the discretion not to send them to prison if they chose.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think they're really good. I mean, right now the Senate has a bill. It's gone through the Senate Judiciary 15-5, and they're going to get it on the floor soon, we think. Hopefully now that looks like the budget deal has been resolved, the budget issues have been resolved, it looks like there'll be time this year for that. And I've heard the House of Representatives.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, well, he's a Missouri Valley guy and so am I in Wichita State. He went to Illinois State. So he wanted to write about something. So we told him, hey, this is coming out. Are you interested? He wrote a blurb about it last October. And it was one of those things. We didn't think anything of it. And then the Daily Beast picked up something, the Huffington Post, Yahoo. It kind of built and built, and then there was an article in the Wichita paper, then Politico, Charles and I did not ed. And what happened was the Republicans, the Republicans controlled the Senate and the House. There were a lot of bills pending, and I think our friends on the left said, this is an issue we all care about deeply. It's one we can actually agree on. Let's get something done. And we got pulled into it. And we've been happy to do it. It's been great. And, you know, it would be great actually to work on something besides this, more than this after hopefully we get some success at the federal level with criminal justice reform because we're really”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“From Democrat to Republican last fall, around that time we'd announced that program we were doing with the NACDL in the Sixth Amendment. And I have someone I've worked with at the New York Times who had interviewed us before and was interested in criminal justice reform, a guy named Carl Hulse. Carl Williams.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, I don't know what the answer is actually, and this is just me. I have, in some ways, a fundamental problem with the idea that the government who is literally taking away my life, liberty, and property, trying to do that on the one hand, is going to also fund my lawyer and then isn't doing it, and then they're going to put me away anyway. So I think there's an inherent conflict of interest. That's one of the things we're looking at with the NACDL. We're looking at state programs that do work and don't work and what the best practices are, and then go from there. And we don't know what the path forward will be, but I think in a lot of these things, David, you know, you've seen the left and the right come together. You mentioned that we got pulled in because we could be influential. That was my point about the spontaneous order. When the Senate flipped, people started to realize.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“There's a need for a lot of things. There is a need for funding of those programs, which is why when we talk about the moral, constitutional, and the fiscal case, the fiscal case is the moral case in a lot of ways, because the 80 billion, 250 billion we're spending on our criminal justice system and the 80 billion on incarceration, if we could make sure we had the right people in prison and let a lot of people not enter prison, keep them out to begin with, and then have shorter sentences, we could save money to spend it on other things. So you think reform?”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Adequate defense. What AFP does, it's a separate organization. We do have ties to it. But the Sixth Amendment issues have pre-existed all of this. It's been an empty problem. I understand.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I'm sorry, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, it's an organization like his name says of practicing criminal defense lawyers. And it's the best of the best of the criminal bar. And they go far left, far right, anarchists, whatever. But they are the people you want if the government's trying to take your life, liberty, or property away. Good friend of mine named Norman Reemer runs the NACDL. We announced we were going to give grants to the NACDL for an indigent defense study program because the Sixth Amendment obviously guarantees the right to counsel. And Gideon versus Wainwright says the state, if you can't afford a lawyer, one must be provided for you by the state, but it's an empty promise because of the lack of funding in these different programs.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, that was the thing. On the Republican side. Well, what happened was exactly what happened was about this time last year, we announced a new program with the NACDL studying intelligent defense programs.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“At the Institute of Polics, excuse me, and CUT 50, that organization, the Center for American Progress, people knew we were passionate about this issue and knew we had credibility around it. We weren't just trying to fix you.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, no, this past year I have. It's been interesting. A lot of my colleagues spend time on it more than me. But this past year I have, and it's because really it's what Charles would call spontaneous order, I think. And what I mean by that is we were pulled into this fight by people on the left. We've worked with the ACLU before, but much more closely with the ACLU, with Van Jones and Shaka Sengora who's going to be here tonight at the time.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“on indigen defense programs. They also need to look at sentencing and prison reform, and they need to look at reentry issues. How do people get treated as offenders when they get out of prison? Because a lot of times they can't get jobs, they can't get loans, they can't live with their families, all those things. So we started back in 2003, once we got involved, you can't stop once you start working on it because everything you see, it doesn't seem just. It doesn't seem right.”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Did we think it was just because we got handled, we thought, pretty shabbily. It was doctored evidence in the grand jury, overreach by the prosecutor's selective use of these laws with vague intent standards. And so we were tasked, I was tasked with others, to look at ways we could improve that. And we started working with the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and Heritage. It was from the beginning a left-right coalition. And we started out looking at first it was the, you have to, from my perspective, our point of view is it's a holistic system, our criminal justice system. You start with the laws that are in place. What have we decided that is that serious a matter that we're going to make a criminal and we can take people's life, liberty, and property away? You need to also look at the grand jury process, how cases are charged, the power that prosecutors have, which is way too much in my opinion. You also need to look at how trials work, particularly for poor people. We're working with the”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Of different things happened, and the indictments came out. Five, six years later, we were able to get the case dismissed as to them. They were exonerated because they hadn't done anything wrong. They hadn't been perfect, but thank God being perfect, not being perfect isn't a crime in this country. So the charges against them went away and we pled guilty to the original false statement that we had found in self-disclosed. After that got done with the way Charles looks at the world, what did we do? What did we bring to the table there that we can correct? And so we looked at the way we handle compliance issues, the way we did investigations, make sure we had the right independence between the people who investigated and who were involved in the day-to-day, all those things. Look at our compliance programs. And then we also looked at our relationships with regulators, trying to have a better discussion with them. You don't want to be always going to a regulator when you have an issue. You want to be talking to them all the time. And then the next step was outwardly. What on the system? What in the system did we see that didn't work the way we thought it would work?”
2015-11-09 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 10 - Mark Holden · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source