DA Jeff Reisig boasts of a “new era of accountability,” but critics say it’s a return to mass incarceration.
California voters were promised a solution. Proposition 36, passed with the appeal of getting “tough” on crime while claiming to offer support for addiction and mental health treatment, was supposed to be a measured response to public frustration over retail theft and the overdose crisis.
But only 100 days in, the cracks are already showing. A system once praised for beginning to reverse decades of mass incarceration is now steering back toward the punitive models of the past—and it’s doing so under the banner of reform.
Yolo County District Attorney Jeff Reisig, one of Prop. 36’s most vocal champions, recently boasted at a press event that “the rules of the game have changed for criminals—and they know it.”
He pointed to a wave of new arrests for petty theft and low-level fentanyl offenses as a sign that the law is working. But let’s be honest: a spike in arrests is not a sign of progress—it’s a warning flare.
DA Reisig’s anecdotal reports of business owners seeing fewer repeat shoplifters may play well in press conferences, but they ignore the deeper truth: punishing our way out of poverty and addiction doesn’t work.
What’s really changing is not behavior, but policy: California is reactivating the same criminal justice machinery that created the largest carceral system in the world.
The felony theft provisions of Prop. 36 ensure that someone with two prior petty theft convictions—no matter how small—now faces a prison sentence. This kind of “three strikes for shoplifting” approach is eerily reminiscent of the 1990s laws that led to mass incarceration in the first place.
These new provisions disproportionately target the same populations that have always been over-criminalized: poor people, unhoused individuals, and those with untreated mental illness or substance use disorders.
As if on cue, California’s court system is beginning to buckle.
On March 18, a prominent judge issued a warning: Prop. 36 is leading to a “train wreck” as courts struggle to absorb the flood of new cases. Public defenders are already overwhelmed.
Treatment infrastructure—one of the initiative’s supposed pillars—remains woefully underfunded. And instead of investing in real alternatives to incarceration, the state is now diverting more people into jails and prisons under the guise of accountability.
There is an unmistakable disconnect between what Prop. 36 promised and what it is delivering.
A felony is a serious crime. A misdemeanor is a minor offense against the law.
DA Reisig’s anecdotal reports of business owners seeing fewer repeat shoplifters may play well in press conferences, but they ignore the deeper truth: punishing our way out of poverty and addiction doesn’t work.
What’s more, this approach risks re-entrenching racial disparities in the criminal legal system. Black and Brown Californians are already overrepresented in theft and drug arrests. Prop. 36 threatens to deepen that disparity by ratcheting up consequences without addressing the underlying causes.
And while proponents tout harsh penalties as a deterrent, that theory doesn’t hold up. Study after study shows that the severity of punishment is far less effective at deterring crime than the certainty of being caught.
In fact, overly-harsh sentences often make reentry harder, increase recidivism, and destroy lives—especially when they’re imposed for low-level, nonviolent offenses.
Let’s not forget the human cost. A 19-year-old addicted to fentanyl who sells a small amount to support their habit now faces years in prison. A single mother caught stealing diapers for the third time could become a convicted felon.
A system once praised for beginning to reverse decades of mass incarceration is now steering back toward the punitive models of the past — and it’s doing so under the banner of reform.
And all while California still lacks the treatment beds, mental health providers, and wraparound services necessary to meet the scale of these crises. That’s not justice. That’s policy failure disguised as toughness.
What Prop. 36 has made abundantly clear is that we can’t afford to legislate based on viral videos and moral panic.
We need evidence-based strategies that invest in people, not punishment. That means strengthening diversion programs, expanding behavioral health care, restoring pathways to employment and housing, and rejecting the idea that incarceration is the only answer to social problems.
The current trajectory is unsustainable—and we’ve been here before. If we allow Prop. 36 to continue unchecked, California will not be leading the nation on criminal justice reform. We’ll be relapsing into the very system we’ve spent decades trying to undo. And it will be those with the least—those with no lobbyists or media advocates—who will suffer most.
Prop. 36 is not fixing our justice system. It’s filling it. And if we’re not careful, this “new era of accountability” will come to look a lot like the old era of mass incarceration—just rebranded and re-legitimized for a new generation.
