May 2019

NASHUA, N.H. — Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., on Wednesday said she took issue with Joe Biden’s claim that the 1994 crime bill, which he voted for, did not lead to mass incarceration in the U.S.

"I have a great deal of respect for Vice President Joe Biden, but I disagree. That crime bill, that 1994 crime bill, it did contribute to mass incarceration in this country,” Harris told reporters after a town hall in New Hampshire.

Harris added that the bill "encouraged and was the first time that we had a federal three-strikes law."

“It funded the building of more prisons in the states. So I disagree, sadly,” she said.

Harris was responding to comments made by Biden, one of many rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination, a day earlier in the same state. He said that the bill did not lead to mass incarceration.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/kamala-harris-disputes-joe-biden-s-claims-about-1994-crime-n1006106

https://youtu.be/zCaO0NvadlQ

September 2019

Just four years ago, Biden was still proudly referring to the law as the “1994 Biden Crime Bill.”

It was a moment that may come back to haunt Joe Biden—perhaps as soon as tonight’s Democratic debate: In an earlier round this summer, Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey wheeled on the former vice president, attacking his sponsorship of the 1994 federal crime bill with a roundhouse punch. “There are people right now in prison for life for drug offenses,” Booker said, “because you stood up and used that tough-on-crime phony rhetoric that got a lot of people elected but destroyed communities like mine.”

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/09/joe-biden-crime-bill-and-americans-short-memory/597547/