Prosecutorial Non-enforcement: Legal and Policy Dimensions

On April 14, 2022, the State Democracy Research Initiative and the Frank J. Remington Center at the University of Wisconsin Law School hosted a conversation among legal scholars on prosecutorial discretion at the state and local level. UW Law Professor Cecelia Klingele was joined by Columbia Law Professor Kerrel Murray, author of Populist Prosecutorial Nullification (NYU Law Review, 2021), and UC Hastings Law Professor Zachary Price, who recently released a draft paper entitled Faithful Execution in the Fifty States. The discussion explored when, and to what extent, prosecutors can lawfully decline to enforce certain state laws, and the implications of such decisions for democracy.