Four district attorneys in Georgia are asking a judge to strike down a law creating a commission to discipline and remove state prosecutors, arguing it violates the U.S. and Georgia constitutions.
The attack on Georgia’s Prosecuting Attorneys Qualifications Commission, filed Wednesday in Fulton County Superior Court in Atlanta, comes after Republicans pushed through a law creating the panel earlier this year. Republican Gov. Brian Kemp pledged when he signed the law that it would curb “far-left prosecutors” who are “making our communities less safe.”
Sherry Boston, the district attorney in the overwhelmingly Democratic Atlanta suburb of DeKalb County and the lead plaintiff, called the issue “bigger than Georgia.”
“We are talking about prosecutorial discretion and prosecutorial independence, both of which have been solidly under assault the last few years,” Boston told The Associated Press.
Like GOP candidates nationwide, Kemp ran anti-crime campaigns in 2022, accusing Democrats of coddling criminals. They are pushing back after some progressive prosecutors have brought fewer drug possession cases and sought shorter prison sentences.
It’s been “incredibly convenient” for Republicans to oppose progressive prosecutors, said University of North Carolina law professor Carissa Hessick, who directs the Prosecutors and Politics Project. Similar efforts have taken place in Tennessee, Missouri, Indiana, Pennsylvania and Florida.
“As the progressive prosecution movement gained national prominence, I think it was an easy target for folks on the right, especially once there was an uptick in certain crimes in certain cities,” Hessick said.
The Georgia law raises fundamental questions about prosecutorial discretion. That bedrock of the American judicial system says a prosecutor decides what charges to bring and how heavy of a sentence to seek.
