Political Ideology and Attitudes Toward Pretrial Justice: Exploring the Mediating Role of Racial Resentment

Abstract

Although jurisdictions across the U.S. have implemented pretrial justice reforms with varying support from lawmakers across the political divide, there is limited research exploring public opinion of pretrial justice. This study explores possible partisan dimensions of pretrial justice attitudes, focusing on perceptions of detention as crime control, defendants being undeserving of detention, and detention punishing defendants. Given recent research highlighting the influence of racial resentment on attitudes toward criminal justice, we use path analyses to test whether racial resentment mediates any relationship between political ideology and pretrial justice attitudes. Relative to conservatives, liberals are less supportive of using pretrial detention for crime control and more concerned that pretrial detention punishes defendants. These associations operate directly and indirectly via racial resentment; conservatives report higher racial resentment, and racial resentment is associated with attitudes regarding each dimension of pretrial ­justice. Addressing modern racism is critical for bipartisan pretrial justice reform.