Should the 2024 votes in many states be called an “anti-crime election”?

In California, Proposition 36 was aimed at counteracting a 2014 initiative, Prop. 47, which had raised the felony theft threshold to $950 and converted many drug offenses to misdemeanors.

Prop 36, which passed by a large majority, allows prosecutors to file theft charges if the perpetrator is a repeat offender, increases penalties for mass thefts and requires certain sentences to be served in state prisons instead of county jails.

Vox.com offers a similar setting, He said if even California's liberal voters supported the measure, wouldn't other states potentially want something similar, if not tougher? “It will absolutely put wind in the sails of the opponents [criminal justice] Reform,” said Insha Rahman of Vera Action, predicting that California’s prison and prison population will rise.

“Progressive” prosecutor in Los Angeles County George Gasconwho succeeded Kamala Harris as San Francisco district attorney before becoming L.A.'s top prosecutor, lost his re-election to Nathan Hochman, who ran on a law-and-order platform.

Anti-crime voter sentiment also reached north to the Bay Area, where voters had already recalled former San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin in 2022. Boudin's successor, Brooke Jenkins, appears poised to win election to a full term. In Alameda County (home to Oakland), District Attorney Pamela Price and Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao appear probably to lose their respective recall elections.

Price and Thao positioned themselves as criminal justice reformers who wanted to reduce the footprint of the justice system.

In Tampa, Florida, Democrat Andrew Warren was suspended by Gov. Ron DeSantis in 2022 for his no-prosecution policy. lost his re-election bid against Republican state Attorney General Susan Lopez. In Athens, Georgia – where the killing of Laken Riley by an illegal immigrant sparked outrage – Kalki Yalamanchili won a landslide victory over incumbent District Attorney Deborah Gonzalez, who was elected on a reform platform.

In Phoenix was Tamika Wooten, who continued to advocate for alternatives to incarceration and restorative justice, lost her attempt to oust incumbent Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell, a Republican. Law-and-order prosecutors also won in Macomb County, Michigan and Kenosha County, Wisconsin.

Progressive prosecutors won key races — particularly in Texas, where voters in Austin, El Paso and Houston handed victories to candidates who positioned themselves as reformers. They also prevailed in Albany (NY), Orlando (Florida) and in Columbus and Cincinnati (Ohio).

Mass outrage over various police incidents that went viral on social media appeared to overcome any reservations Americans had about the hundreds of legislative and administrative criminal justice reform initiatives of the 2010s and early 2020s. It is now clear, argues Mangual, that many voters have reached their limits when it comes to how much crime and unrest they are willing to tolerate.

He claims that the vast majority of prisoners in the United States are violent, chronic offenders who have missed more than one “second chance.” Police are imperfect and sometimes abuse their authority, but fatal encounters that spark public outrage are statistically rare.

It remains to be seen how much (if at all) this election cycle will influence the left's approach, Mangual concludes.