Anti-hate legislation’s first scheduled hearing canceled by Assemblymember Nguyen
Bill is similar to previous legislation sponsored by Jim Cooper
Soon after taking her oath of office in December for the District 10 California Assembly seat, Stephanie Nguyen introduced legislation that became this session’s Assembly Bill 32.
The legislation, which is a near duplicate of legislation advanced by her predecessor, former Assembly Member and now Sacramento County Sheriff Jim Cooper, seeks to reclassify certain hate crimes. When Nguyen introduced the bill, a press release said, “Bill seeks to reclassify hate crimes to ensure perpetrators of the most violent hate crimes are not eligible for early release from prison.”
The first hearing was scheduled for 9 a.m. on Tuesday, February 28, before the Assembly’s Public Safety Committee. However, according to the California Legislative Information website, the “hearing canceled at request of author.”
Groups like the American Civil Liberties Union opposed Cooper’s legislation. Cooper’s bill, Assembly Bill 266, twice failed to advance out of the Public Safety committee.
The eight-member Public Safety Committee is chaired by Reginald Byron Jones-Sawyer (D – Los Angeles). According to his biography, Jones-Sawyer’s “legislative agenda is focused on criminal justice and corrections reform, ending the school-to-prison pipeline, improving access to California’s education systems, as well as fair employment and job creation in South LA and communities like it throughout the state.”
