This is silly. The "mainstream press" is nothing more than a mirror. If there were widespread outrage about justice and prison reform, there would be much more coverage of it. There really just isn't much interest, and it's honestly as fervent on the pro-punishment side as the reform side (e.g. Jeff Sessions' disastrous but celebrated term as Attorney General in rolling back progress made at the Federal level: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/jeff-sessions-is-trying...)

As with many other issues in the US, there’s a connection to wealth and race. Civil rights organizations have been talking about this for years with their pleas mostly falling on deaf ears. Some major media started covering it after looking into some of the larger reasons behind the protests in Ferguson, MO. There have been quite a few advocates in the “far-left” political spectrum like Bernie Sanders and some places have ended cash bail.

https://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/sande...

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/29/nyregion/kalief-browder-c...

https://www.npr.org/2018/08/28/642795284/california-becomes-...

https://www.npr.org/2018/09/02/644085158/what-changed-after-...

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/jailed-f...

Similar to our newly found compassion for people struggling with drug addiction, this won’t be solved until we stop viewing those affected as “others”.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/how-you-could-go-to-debtors-pri...

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/could-debtors-prison-make-a-com...

https://www.propublica.org/article/a-lawsuit-over-ferguson-d...

http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/Ferguson-sued-modern-day-debtors-...

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/02/debtors...

https://www.npr.org/2014/05/21/313118629/supreme-court-rulin... - https://www.cbsnews.com/news/as-economy-flails-debtors-priso... - https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/08/magazine/cities-fine-poor...

It’s not true that’s it’s not been talked about, or even that it’s not covered by mainstream media. Many people are not paying attention and some mainstream media are actively against criminal justice reform.

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/tucker-carlson-criminal-just...

It’s a political issue and a human rights issue, but politics is often reduced to sound bites with few taking the effort to really understand an issue and support those working to change it.

There are also unsurprising contradictions. The Trump administration signed legislation that addresses sentencing disparities in the war on drugs while simultaneously resuming federal death penalty executions even while its been widely reported that possibly more than 1 in 10 of those of death row are innocent.