In Their Own Words: Prosecutors on the Politics of Backlash

Abstract

This article examines the politicization of the criminal justice system in the United States, focusing on local prosecutorial reform. While progressive and conservative prosecutors have initiated reforms in jurisdictions throughout the United States for years, violent and antidemocratic backlash against prosecutors and judges alike has taken center stage. How do local prosecutors understand and respond to efforts to limit reforms? To explore this question, we draw on an analysis of US prosecutors who ran for office in 2024 as well as 68 semi-structured interviews with prosecutors and candidates for prosecutor. Our interviews offer a unique look into the politics of local prosecution and show that backlash is insidious, pervasive, and ranges beyond highly publicized recall elections and efforts to remove sitting prosecutors through executive or legislative intervention. Less visible, yet violent and obstructive, forms of backlash at the hands of law enforcement and the public are also highly consequential for the ability of prosecutors to do their jobs, keep their jobs, maintain their professional reputations, and ensure their own personal safety. Ultimately, we argue that backlash against reform prosecutors is part of a wider set of antidemocratic projects at work in the United States today.