December 20, 2018 10:03AM 

# Cato Daily Podcast: Another Perspective on FIRST STEP 

By [Caleb O. Brown](https://www.cato.org/people/caleb-o-brown) 

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The U.S. House is expected to vote on the [FIRST STEP Act](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2018/12/18/first-step-act-passes-senate-criminal-justice-bill-moves-house/2356547002/) today after the legislation passed the Senate late Tuesday.

For today’s [Cato Daily Podcast](https://www.cato.org/podcast), I [spoke with](https://www.cato.org/multimedia/cato-daily-podcast/first-step-act-passes-senate) [Shon Hopwood](https://www.law.georgetown.edu/faculty/shon-hopwood/) of the Georgetown University Law Center about what the act does and why he views the legislation as both historic and modest reform.

Hopwood [spoke at the Cato Institute’s Cato Club 200 event this year where he detailed his own experiences as a federal inmate and why sweeping criminal justice reform remains necessary.](https://www.cato.org/multimedia/cato-daily-podcast/threat-creeping-overcriminalization)

##### Related Tags 

[Constitutional Law](https://www.cato.org/constitutional-law), [Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies](https://www.cato.org/robert-levy-center-constitutional-studies) 

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