RICHMOND, Va. (CN) — Virginia’s annual legislative session, now in its second year under Democratic control, continues to show what happens when political power shifts after decades in the hands of Republicans.
Friday was the 30-day, 2021 session’s midpoint, known as crossover where bills switch between chambers for final review and passage, and the bills left standing this year once again highlight just how stark a political shift can be.
The biggest headline making bills relate to marijuana and the death penalty — legalizing the first and abolishing the second.
Virginia has long been one of the nation’s leaders in capital punishment. Second only to Texas, the state has executed 1,389 people since 1608 with 113 of those since 1976 when the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the practice.
But now similar versions of a bill ending the practice have passed both chambers. Governor Ralph Northam also asked for its demise at the session’s open, so it’s expected to become law in the coming months.
“The death penalty is an antiquated, expensive, inhuman punishment that does not aid in crime deterrence or advance public safety, but it does disproportionately impact people of color in our country,” said House Majority Leader Charniele Herring, a Democrat from Alexandria, one of the bill’s chief co-patrons, in a statement following its passage.
Notably two House Republicans crossed the aisle to support the effort. However in the Senate, it passed along party lines after amendments to keep the punishment in cases where law enforcement officers were killed were nixed.
Marijuana reform kicked off last year when the state passed a decriminalization bill, but Democrats in both chambers have set their sights — and made some promises to constituents — on a full legalization and retail market creation measure this year. While both chambers have since passed their own versions of a new law, differences between the two are plentiful.
The Senate version allows localities to opt out of local markets, the House version does not. The Senate allows vertical integration, with companies owning grow operations, production outfits and retail stores, the House does not. And the House has different priorities and caps for licenses than its smaller, more moderate counterpart.
Delegate Lashrecse Aird, a Democrat from Petersburg, says her chamber’s stronger effort to maintain social equity, considering the long running “war on drugs'” disperate impact on Black and brown populations, is where the issues lie.
“We’re trying to get to a place where we’re not only rectifying the social inequalities, we’re also taking the opportunities to make sure it impacts Black and brown communities that have been disproportionately impacted,” she said.
The differences have added stress on the process, and while Sen. Jennifer McClellan, a Democrat from Richmond, argues her chamber is similarly prioritizing equity, she believes the state will most likely see an incremental process, starting with the removal of the prohibition on simple possession first.
Del. Schuyler VanValkenburg, a Democrat from Henrico, is on a House subcommittee that spent a week debating their version of pot legalization and will eventually get their hands on the Senate version. He expressed concerns about the wide disconnect between the two chambers’ drafts and how that might impact final votes.
“The kind of space where you can get enough people to compromise is going to be difficult,” he said.
Alongside marijuana and the death penalty are a number of other criminal justice reform efforts Democrats have long called for and are finally seeing get a chance at passage.
An end to mandatory minimum sentences, giving legislative committees the ability to examine racial equity impacts on further criminal law changes, bail reform and other issues have all succeeded under Democratic control where they would have tanked under the GOP’s former leadership.
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