California Voters Refuse to End Forced Prisoner Labor
MINNEAPOLIS, MN.-
California voters have shifted to the right on criminal justice, after refusing to amend the state Constitution to end forced prisoner labor, known as involuntary servitude.
Forced labor is prohibited in the California Constitution except when imposed as punishment for a crime.
Proposition 6 sought to prohibit state prisons from forcing incarcerated people to work against their will, but the measure has not gained enough support.
It is estimated that approximately one-third of people incarcerated in California prisons work in jobs that help maintain prisons, as well as fight wildfires, by cutting fire lines and trimming vegetation.
“People who refuse to work or do other activities face consequences such as not being able to make regular calls,” according to a report from the Office of the Executive Analyst.
Inmates are paid less than a dollar an hour, a wage that has drawn criticism from civil rights advocates.
Proposition 6 also ended punishments imposed on detainees who refused to work.
Conservative states like Alabama and Tennessee have already ended “involuntary servitude,” as forced labor is known, in their prisons in recent elections, so voters’ decision marks a shift to the right in one of the most liberal states in the country.
This is not the only rejection of progressivism by voters in California, Proposition 36, which will impose stricter penalties for petty theft and fentanyl-related crimes, was approved by a large majority.
The measure repeals key parts of Proposition 47, approved by voters in 2014 and which relaxed penalties for minor crimes such as shoplifting, arguing that the heavy-handed policy was ineffective and increased the prison population.
Added to this is that the Los Angeles prosecutor, Cuban-American George Gascón, with a progressive tendency, was defeated by an independent candidate, who withdrew from the Republican Party.
