Barr has previously said that white and black offenders are treated the same by the criminal justice system.
Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ), a likely Democratic contender for the 2020 presidential nomination, pushed back on attorney general nominee William Barr’s statements about race and the criminal justice system at a Senate hearing Tuesday.
Barr has argued in the past that “there’s no statistical evidence of racism in the criminal justice system,” according to comments cited by Booker. The senator pressed Barr on the point, detailing evidence of exactly such a bias.
Barr responded by noting that there’s “no doubt” there’s “racism in the system,” while adding that he found that it’s “working” overall.
As Vox’s German Lopez writes, Barr was an architect of many policies that have since led to the disproportionate incarceration of African Americans.
