The department removed public access to a number of reports on incarceration in the state, including when presidential candidate Kamala Harris (D.) was California's attorney general. Twice a year, the CDCR releases information about the number of new individuals incarcerated in the California prison system as part of its "Offender Data Points" series. These reports provide important information on demographics, sentence length, offense type, and other figures relevant to criminal justice and incarceration.
Until recently, these reports were publicly available at the CDCR's website. A search using archive.org's Wayback Machine reveals that as of April 25, 2019‐the most recent indexed date‐ODP reports were available dating back to the spring of 2009. As of August 2019, the same web page now serves only a single ODP report, the one for Spring 2019. The pre-2019 reports have been removed.
The changes matter in part because the reports contain information about Harris's entire time as state A.G., 2011 to 2017. Harris has taken fire from multiple opponents for her "tough on crime" record as California's top cop, an image that she has tried to shed as a far-left senator and presidential candidate.
One particularly brutal attack came Wednesday night when Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D., Hi.) laid into Harris for her record on criminal justice. Gabbard cited a Washington Free Beacon analysis ‐ based in part on the ODP reports ‐ that found that more than 1,500 Californians were sent to prison for marijuana-related offenses while Harris was attorney general.
The data have been used in other Free Beacon reporting on Harris, specifically the finding that more than 120,000 black and Latino Californians were sent to prison while she was in the State A.G.'s office.