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John Minchillo/AP; Mario Tama/Getty; Haven Daley/AP
If you care about police accountability, abortion rights, or racial justice, you should be paying attention to district attorney races this election season.
As chief prosecutors in their counties, DAs hold a lot of power to choose who gets charged with a crime and who doesn’t: They can flat-out decide to never prosecute a specific offense, whether it’s terminating a pregnancy or possessing some weed—especially if there are other types of violations they want to take more seriously, like police brutality or corporate malfeasance.
But reformist candidates hoping to curb mass incarceration or keep cops in line will face a big challenge at the polls this year. Widespread concerns about violent crime could give their more moderate or conservative opponents a boost, all at a time when it’s unusually difficult to know whether the nation’s lawlessness is actually rising or falling.