As a Cook County, Illinois, jury last week found actor Jussie Smollett guilty of faking a racist and homophobic attack on himself, attention quickly turned to State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, the prosecutor who tried to let him off easy.
Politically speaking, she’s not alone. Handily re-elected last year to a second term and the first Black woman to hold the office in Cook County, Foxx is widely viewed as one of the most prominent members of a controversial movement labeled “progressive prosecutors.”
Anger and frustration over crime, policing and racial justice issues in recent years that predate the pivotal police murder of George Floyd have brought a new and often-controversial type of “progressive prosecutor” to office.
Unlike the old-school prosecutors who traditionally won office by promising tough-on-crime policies that stressed convictions and incarceration, the new reformers campaign on both public safety and reducing mass incarceration.
They tend to prefer such alternative punishments as treatment programs for drug-related crimes, reduced prosecution of low-level crimes and diversion to mental health treatment, counseling, employment, education and substance abuse programs, particularly for juveniles.