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50-year war on drugs imprisoned millions of Black Americans

FILE - In this Feb. 20, 2014, file photo, prisoners from Sacramento County await processing after arriving at the Deuel Vocational Institution in Tracy, Calif. In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs. It is questionable whether anyone won the war. Who suffered the worst losses is clearer: Black Americans, their families and their communities. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File) This July 2021 photo provided by Gerald Moody shows Bill Underwood, a senior fellow with The Sentencing Project's Campaign to End Life Imprisonment, in New York. Underwood was a successful R&B and hip hop music promoter in New York City in the late seventies through the eighties, before his 33-year incarceration. A judge granted him compassionate release from federal custody in January, noting his lauded reputation as a mentor to young men in prison and his high-risk exposure to COVID-19 at age 67. (Gerald Moody via AP) This July 2021 photo provided by Gerald Moody shows Bill Underwood, a senior fellow with The Sentencing Project's Campaign to End Life Imprisonment, and his daughter, Ebony, CEO of We Got Us Now, a national nonprofit that support children and young adults impacted by parental incarceration, in New York. He was a successful R&B and hip hop music promoter in New York City in the late seventies through the eighties, before his 33-year incarceration. A judge granted him compassionate release from federal custody in January, noting his lauded reputation as a mentor to young men in prison and his high-risk exposure to COVID-19 at age 67. (Gerald Moody via AP) The radio in Alton Lucas' pickup is set to his favorite religious station as he does errands around Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. Lucas said he still wonders what would happen for him and his family if he no longer carried the weight of a drug-related conviction on his record. “So occasionally, I would go apply for a job just to make them do the background check. I'm making them come back and tell me what they found. And I want to see how they are going to respond to me. ... It’s almost like a life sentence." (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas drives home after dropping some firewood at a local convenience store outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as "DJ Nabs," looks at an old newspaper clipping, top, about his lifelong best friend, Alton Lucas, in his home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. At the height of the war on drugs, Lucas went to jail for a series of robberies he says were committed to feed his crack cocaine habit. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) In this late 1980's photo provided by musician DJ Nabs, his childhood friend, Alton Lucas, jumps in a field at Durham High School in Durham, N.C. As a teenager, Alton Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. (Courtesy DJ Nabs via AP) A photo of Alton Lucas' wife, Bronwyn Lucas, and their children, sits on a desk at his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. His wife, whom he’d met at a fatherhood counseling conference, said his past had barred him from doing something as innocuous as chaperoning their children on school field trips. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this April 9, 1988, file photo, Los Angeles police officers search one of seven people arrested for selling narcotics in the south-central area of Los Angeles, as more than 1,000 police officers raided gang strongholds to attack on drug dealing and street violence in the nation's second largest city. In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs. It is questionable whether anyone won the war. Who suffered the worst losses is clearer: Black Americans, their families and their communities. (AP Photo/Douglas C. Pizac, File) FILE - In this Oct. 11, 1982 file photo, first lady Nancy Reagan speaks at the first national conference of the National Federation of Parents for Drug-Free Youth in Washington. “Many people think drug prevention is ‘just say no,’ like Nancy Reagan did in the '80s, and we know that did not work,” said Becky Vance, CEO of the Texas-based agency Drug Prevention Resources, which has advocated for evidenced-based anti-drug and alcohol abuse education for more than 85 years. (AP Photo/Barry Thumma, File) FILE - In this June 17, 1971, file photo, President Richard Nixon explains aspects of the special message sent to the Congress, asking for an extra $155 million for a new program to combat the use of drugs. He labeled drug abuse "a national emergency" and said the money would be used to "tighten the noose around the necks of drug peddlers and thereby loosen the noose around the necks of drug users." At left is Egil Krogh, deputy director of the Domestic Council. At right is Dr. Jerome Jaffe, who was recruited by Nixon to lead a new drug strategy. (AP Photo/Harvey Georges, File) Alton Lucas delivers wrapped firewood to a convenience store near his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. It's one of the many jobs he performs as part of his Sunflower Landscaping, a business he founded through the program Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Old photos of Alton Lucas, top and bottom on left, and musician DJ Nabs, lower right, are assembled in a scrapbook in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. As a teenager, Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. In the late 1980s, he was already the right-hand man to his musically inclined best friend, Youtha Anthony Fowler, who many hip-hop and R&B heads know today as DJ Nabs. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as DJ Nabs, left, listens to lifelong best friend Alton Lucas talk about his drug addiction in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. By their teenage years, Lucas and Fowler were deejaying for college parties at nearby Duke University. Together, “Luke Duke,” as Lucas was known, and “Nabisco Disco,” as Fowler was called, helped popularize hip-hop music among undergraduates. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas sits on the porch of his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. As a teenager, Alton Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. In the late 1980s, he was already the right-hand man to his musically inclined best friend, Youtha Anthony Fowler, who many hip hop and R&B heads know today as DJ Nabs. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this Feb. 20, 2014, file photo, prisoners from Sacramento County await processing after arriving at the Deuel Vocational Institution in Tracy, Calif. In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs. It is questionable whether anyone won the war. Who suffered the worst losses is clearer: Black Americans, their families and their communities. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File) This July 2021 photo provided by Gerald Moody shows Bill Underwood, a senior fellow with The Sentencing Project's Campaign to End Life Imprisonment, in New York. Underwood was a successful R&B and hip hop music promoter in New York City in the late seventies through the eighties, before his 33-year incarceration. A judge granted him compassionate release from federal custody in January, noting his lauded reputation as a mentor to young men in prison and his high-risk exposure to COVID-19 at age 67. (Gerald Moody via AP) This July 2021 photo provided by Gerald Moody shows Bill Underwood, a senior fellow with The Sentencing Project's Campaign to End Life Imprisonment, and his daughter, Ebony, CEO of We Got Us Now, a national nonprofit that support children and young adults impacted by parental incarceration, in New York. He was a successful R&B and hip hop music promoter in New York City in the late seventies through the eighties, before his 33-year incarceration. A judge granted him compassionate release from federal custody in January, noting his lauded reputation as a mentor to young men in prison and his high-risk exposure to COVID-19 at age 67. (Gerald Moody via AP) The radio in Alton Lucas' pickup is set to his favorite religious station as he does errands around Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. Lucas said he still wonders what would happen for him and his family if he no longer carried the weight of a drug-related conviction on his record. “So occasionally, I would go apply for a job just to make them do the background check. I'm making them come back and tell me what they found. And I want to see how they are going to respond to me. ... It’s almost like a life sentence." (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas drives home after dropping some firewood at a local convenience store outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as "DJ Nabs," looks at an old newspaper clipping, top, about his lifelong best friend, Alton Lucas, in his home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. At the height of the war on drugs, Lucas went to jail for a series of robberies he says were committed to feed his crack cocaine habit. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) In this late 1980's photo provided by musician DJ Nabs, his childhood friend, Alton Lucas, jumps in a field at Durham High School in Durham, N.C. As a teenager, Alton Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. (Courtesy DJ Nabs via AP) A photo of Alton Lucas' wife, Bronwyn Lucas, and their children, sits on a desk at his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. His wife, whom he’d met at a fatherhood counseling conference, said his past had barred him from doing something as innocuous as chaperoning their children on school field trips. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas, right, wraps firewood for sale as he and neighbor Ryan Isaac, a correctional officer, chat outside Lucas' home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this April 9, 1988, file photo, Los Angeles police officers search one of seven people arrested for selling narcotics in the south-central area of Los Angeles, as more than 1,000 police officers raided gang strongholds to attack on drug dealing and street violence in the nation's second largest city. In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs. It is questionable whether anyone won the war. Who suffered the worst losses is clearer: Black Americans, their families and their communities. (AP Photo/Douglas C. Pizac, File) FILE - In this Oct. 11, 1982 file photo, first lady Nancy Reagan speaks at the first national conference of the National Federation of Parents for Drug-Free Youth in Washington. “Many people think drug prevention is ‘just say no,’ like Nancy Reagan did in the '80s, and we know that did not work,” said Becky Vance, CEO of the Texas-based agency Drug Prevention Resources, which has advocated for evidenced-based anti-drug and alcohol abuse education for more than 85 years. (AP Photo/Barry Thumma, File) FILE - In this June 17, 1971, file photo, President Richard Nixon explains aspects of the special message sent to the Congress, asking for an extra $155 million for a new program to combat the use of drugs. He labeled drug abuse "a national emergency" and said the money would be used to "tighten the noose around the necks of drug peddlers and thereby loosen the noose around the necks of drug users." At left is Egil Krogh, deputy director of the Domestic Council. At right is Dr. Jerome Jaffe, who was recruited by Nixon to lead a new drug strategy. (AP Photo/Harvey Georges, File) Alton Lucas delivers wrapped firewood to a convenience store near his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. It's one of the many jobs he performs as part of his Sunflower Landscaping, a business he founded through the program Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Old photos of Alton Lucas, top and bottom on left, and musician DJ Nabs, lower right, are assembled in a scrapbook in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. As a teenager, Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. In the late 1980s, he was already the right-hand man to his musically inclined best friend, Youtha Anthony Fowler, who many hip-hop and R&B heads know today as DJ Nabs. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as DJ Nabs, left, listens to lifelong best friend Alton Lucas talk about his drug addiction in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. By their teenage years, Lucas and Fowler were deejaying for college parties at nearby Duke University. Together, “Luke Duke,” as Lucas was known, and “Nabisco Disco,” as Fowler was called, helped popularize hip-hop music among undergraduates. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) This early 1990's photo provided by musician DJ Nabs shows him, left, with his childhood friend, Alton Lucas in North Carolina. (Courtesy DJ Nabs via AP) Alton Lucas sits on the porch of his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. As a teenager, Alton Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. In the late 1980s, he was already the right-hand man to his musically inclined best friend, Youtha Anthony Fowler, who many hip hop and R&B heads know today as DJ Nabs. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this Feb. 20, 2014, file photo, prisoners from Sacramento County await processing after arriving at the Deuel Vocational Institution in Tracy, Calif. In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs. It is questionable whether anyone won the war. Who suffered the worst losses is clearer: Black Americans, their families and their communities. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File) This July 2021 photo provided by Gerald Moody shows Bill Underwood, a senior fellow with The Sentencing Project's Campaign to End Life Imprisonment, in New York. Underwood was a successful R&B and hip hop music promoter in New York City in the late seventies through the eighties, before his 33-year incarceration. A judge granted him compassionate release from federal custody in January, noting his lauded reputation as a mentor to young men in prison and his high-risk exposure to COVID-19 at age 67. (Gerald Moody via AP) This July 2021 photo provided by Gerald Moody shows Bill Underwood, a senior fellow with The Sentencing Project's Campaign to End Life Imprisonment, and his daughter, Ebony, CEO of We Got Us Now, a national nonprofit that support children and young adults impacted by parental incarceration, in New York. He was a successful R&B and hip hop music promoter in New York City in the late seventies through the eighties, before his 33-year incarceration. A judge granted him compassionate release from federal custody in January, noting his lauded reputation as a mentor to young men in prison and his high-risk exposure to COVID-19 at age 67. (Gerald Moody via AP) The radio in Alton Lucas' pickup is set to his favorite religious station as he does errands around Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. Lucas said he still wonders what would happen for him and his family if he no longer carried the weight of a drug-related conviction on his record. “So occasionally, I would go apply for a job just to make them do the background check. I'm making them come back and tell me what they found. And I want to see how they are going to respond to me. ... It’s almost like a life sentence." (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas drives home after dropping some firewood at a local convenience store outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as "DJ Nabs," looks at an old newspaper clipping, top, about his lifelong best friend, Alton Lucas, in his home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. At the height of the war on drugs, Lucas went to jail for a series of robberies he says were committed to feed his crack cocaine habit. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) In this late 1980's photo provided by musician DJ Nabs, his childhood friend, Alton Lucas, jumps in a field at Durham High School in Durham, N.C. As a teenager, Alton Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. (Courtesy DJ Nabs via AP) A photo of Alton Lucas' wife, Bronwyn Lucas, and their children, sits on a desk at his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. His wife, whom he’d met at a fatherhood counseling conference, said his past had barred him from doing something as innocuous as chaperoning their children on school field trips. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas, right, wraps firewood for sale as he and neighbor Ryan Isaac, a correctional officer, chat outside Lucas' home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this April 9, 1988, file photo, Los Angeles police officers search one of seven people arrested for selling narcotics in the south-central area of Los Angeles, as more than 1,000 police officers raided gang strongholds to attack on drug dealing and street violence in the nation's second largest city. In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs. It is questionable whether anyone won the war. Who suffered the worst losses is clearer: Black Americans, their families and their communities. (AP Photo/Douglas C. Pizac, File) FILE - In this Oct. 11, 1982 file photo, first lady Nancy Reagan speaks at the first national conference of the National Federation of Parents for Drug-Free Youth in Washington. “Many people think drug prevention is ‘just say no,’ like Nancy Reagan did in the '80s, and we know that did not work,” said Becky Vance, CEO of the Texas-based agency Drug Prevention Resources, which has advocated for evidenced-based anti-drug and alcohol abuse education for more than 85 years. (AP Photo/Barry Thumma, File) FILE - In this June 17, 1971, file photo, President Richard Nixon explains aspects of the special message sent to the Congress, asking for an extra $155 million for a new program to combat the use of drugs. He labeled drug abuse "a national emergency" and said the money would be used to "tighten the noose around the necks of drug peddlers and thereby loosen the noose around the necks of drug users." At left is Egil Krogh, deputy director of the Domestic Council. At right is Dr. Jerome Jaffe, who was recruited by Nixon to lead a new drug strategy. (AP Photo/Harvey Georges, File) Alton Lucas delivers wrapped firewood to a convenience store near his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. It's one of the many jobs he performs as part of his Sunflower Landscaping, a business he founded through the program Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Old photos of Alton Lucas, top and bottom on left, and musician DJ Nabs, lower right, are assembled in a scrapbook in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. As a teenager, Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. In the late 1980s, he was already the right-hand man to his musically inclined best friend, Youtha Anthony Fowler, who many hip-hop and R&B heads know today as DJ Nabs. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as DJ Nabs, left, listens to lifelong best friend Alton Lucas talk about his drug addiction in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. By their teenage years, Lucas and Fowler were deejaying for college parties at nearby Duke University. Together, “Luke Duke,” as Lucas was known, and “Nabisco Disco,” as Fowler was called, helped popularize hip-hop music among undergraduates. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) This early 1990's photo provided by musician DJ Nabs shows him, left, with his childhood friend, Alton Lucas in North Carolina. (Courtesy DJ Nabs via AP) Alton Lucas sits on the porch of his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. As a teenager, Alton Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. In the late 1980s, he was already the right-hand man to his musically inclined best friend, Youtha Anthony Fowler, who many hip hop and R&B heads know today as DJ Nabs. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this Feb. 20, 2014, file photo, prisoners from Sacramento County await processing after arriving at the Deuel Vocational Institution in Tracy, Calif. In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs. It is questionable whether anyone won the war. Who suffered the worst losses is clearer: Black Americans, their families and their communities. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File) This July 2021 photo provided by Gerald Moody shows Bill Underwood, a senior fellow with The Sentencing Project's Campaign to End Life Imprisonment, in New York. Underwood was a successful R&B and hip hop music promoter in New York City in the late seventies through the eighties, before his 33-year incarceration. A judge granted him compassionate release from federal custody in January, noting his lauded reputation as a mentor to young men in prison and his high-risk exposure to COVID-19 at age 67. (Gerald Moody via AP) This July 2021 photo provided by Gerald Moody shows Bill Underwood, a senior fellow with The Sentencing Project's Campaign to End Life Imprisonment, and his daughter, Ebony, CEO of We Got Us Now, a national nonprofit that support children and young adults impacted by parental incarceration, in New York. He was a successful R&B and hip hop music promoter in New York City in the late seventies through the eighties, before his 33-year incarceration. A judge granted him compassionate release from federal custody in January, noting his lauded reputation as a mentor to young men in prison and his high-risk exposure to COVID-19 at age 67. (Gerald Moody via AP) The radio in Alton Lucas' pickup is set to his favorite religious station as he does errands around Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. Lucas said he still wonders what would happen for him and his family if he no longer carried the weight of a drug-related conviction on his record. “So occasionally, I would go apply for a job just to make them do the background check. I'm making them come back and tell me what they found. And I want to see how they are going to respond to me. ... It’s almost like a life sentence." (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas drives home after dropping some firewood at a local convenience store outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as "DJ Nabs," looks at an old newspaper clipping, top, about his lifelong best friend, Alton Lucas, in his home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. At the height of the war on drugs, Lucas went to jail for a series of robberies he says were committed to feed his crack cocaine habit. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) In this late 1980's photo provided by musician DJ Nabs, his childhood friend, Alton Lucas, jumps in a field at Durham High School in Durham, N.C. As a teenager, Alton Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. (Courtesy DJ Nabs via AP) A photo of Alton Lucas' wife, Bronwyn Lucas, and their children, sits on a desk at his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. His wife, whom he’d met at a fatherhood counseling conference, said his past had barred him from doing something as innocuous as chaperoning their children on school field trips. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas, right, wraps firewood for sale as he and neighbor Ryan Isaac, a correctional officer, chat outside Lucas' home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this April 9, 1988, file photo, Los Angeles police officers search one of seven people arrested for selling narcotics in the south-central area of Los Angeles, as more than 1,000 police officers raided gang strongholds to attack on drug dealing and street violence in the nation's second largest city. In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs. It is questionable whether anyone won the war. Who suffered the worst losses is clearer: Black Americans, their families and their communities. (AP Photo/Douglas C. Pizac, File) FILE - In this Oct. 11, 1982 file photo, first lady Nancy Reagan speaks at the first national conference of the National Federation of Parents for Drug-Free Youth in Washington. “Many people think drug prevention is ‘just say no,’ like Nancy Reagan did in the '80s, and we know that did not work,” said Becky Vance, CEO of the Texas-based agency Drug Prevention Resources, which has advocated for evidenced-based anti-drug and alcohol abuse education for more than 85 years. (AP Photo/Barry Thumma, File) FILE - In this June 17, 1971, file photo, President Richard Nixon explains aspects of the special message sent to the Congress, asking for an extra $155 million for a new program to combat the use of drugs. He labeled drug abuse "a national emergency" and said the money would be used to "tighten the noose around the necks of drug peddlers and thereby loosen the noose around the necks of drug users." At left is Egil Krogh, deputy director of the Domestic Council. At right is Dr. Jerome Jaffe, who was recruited by Nixon to lead a new drug strategy. (AP Photo/Harvey Georges, File) Alton Lucas delivers wrapped firewood to a convenience store near his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. It's one of the many jobs he performs as part of his Sunflower Landscaping, a business he founded through the program Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Old photos of Alton Lucas, top and bottom on left, and musician DJ Nabs, lower right, are assembled in a scrapbook in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. As a teenager, Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. In the late 1980s, he was already the right-hand man to his musically inclined best friend, Youtha Anthony Fowler, who many hip-hop and R&B heads know today as DJ Nabs. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as DJ Nabs, left, listens to lifelong best friend Alton Lucas talk about his drug addiction in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. By their teenage years, Lucas and Fowler were deejaying for college parties at nearby Duke University. Together, “Luke Duke,” as Lucas was known, and “Nabisco Disco,” as Fowler was called, helped popularize hip-hop music among undergraduates. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) This early 1990's photo provided by musician DJ Nabs shows him, left, with his childhood friend, Alton Lucas in North Carolina. (Courtesy DJ Nabs via AP) Alton Lucas sits on the porch of his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. As a teenager, Alton Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. In the late 1980s, he was already the right-hand man to his musically inclined best friend, Youtha Anthony Fowler, who many hip hop and R&B heads know today as DJ Nabs. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this Feb. 20, 2014, file photo, prisoners from Sacramento County await processing after arriving at the Deuel Vocational Institution in Tracy, Calif. In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs. It is questionable whether anyone won the war. Who suffered the worst losses is clearer: Black Americans, their families and their communities. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File) This July 2021 photo provided by Gerald Moody shows Bill Underwood, a senior fellow with The Sentencing Project's Campaign to End Life Imprisonment, and his daughter, Ebony, CEO of We Got Us Now, a national nonprofit that support children and young adults impacted by parental incarceration, in New York. He was a successful R&B and hip hop music promoter in New York City in the late seventies through the eighties, before his 33-year incarceration. A judge granted him compassionate release from federal custody in January, noting his lauded reputation as a mentor to young men in prison and his high-risk exposure to COVID-19 at age 67. (Gerald Moody via AP) The radio in Alton Lucas' pickup is set to his favorite religious station as he does errands around Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. Lucas said he still wonders what would happen for him and his family if he no longer carried the weight of a drug-related conviction on his record. “So occasionally, I would go apply for a job just to make them do the background check. I'm making them come back and tell me what they found. And I want to see how they are going to respond to me. ... It’s almost like a life sentence." (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas drives home after dropping some firewood at a local convenience store outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as "DJ Nabs," looks at an old newspaper clipping, top, about his lifelong best friend, Alton Lucas, in his home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. At the height of the war on drugs, Lucas went to jail for a series of robberies he says were committed to feed his crack cocaine habit. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) In this late 1980's photo provided by musician DJ Nabs, his childhood friend, Alton Lucas, jumps in a field at Durham High School in Durham, N.C. As a teenager, Alton Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. (Courtesy DJ Nabs via AP) A photo of Alton Lucas' wife, Bronwyn Lucas, and their children, sits on a desk at his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. His wife, whom he’d met at a fatherhood counseling conference, said his past had barred him from doing something as innocuous as chaperoning their children on school field trips. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas, right, wraps firewood for sale as he and neighbor Ryan Isaac, a correctional officer, chat outside Lucas' home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this April 9, 1988, file photo, Los Angeles police officers search one of seven people arrested for selling narcotics in the south-central area of Los Angeles, as more than 1,000 police officers raided gang strongholds to attack on drug dealing and street violence in the nation's second largest city. In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs. It is questionable whether anyone won the war. Who suffered the worst losses is clearer: Black Americans, their families and their communities. (AP Photo/Douglas C. Pizac, File) FILE - In this Oct. 11, 1982 file photo, first lady Nancy Reagan speaks at the first national conference of the National Federation of Parents for Drug-Free Youth in Washington. “Many people think drug prevention is ‘just say no,’ like Nancy Reagan did in the '80s, and we know that did not work,” said Becky Vance, CEO of the Texas-based agency Drug Prevention Resources, which has advocated for evidenced-based anti-drug and alcohol abuse education for more than 85 years. (AP Photo/Barry Thumma, File) FILE - In this June 17, 1971, file photo, President Richard Nixon explains aspects of the special message sent to the Congress, asking for an extra $155 million for a new program to combat the use of drugs. He labeled drug abuse "a national emergency" and said the money would be used to "tighten the noose around the necks of drug peddlers and thereby loosen the noose around the necks of drug users." At left is Egil Krogh, deputy director of the Domestic Council. At right is Dr. Jerome Jaffe, who was recruited by Nixon to lead a new drug strategy. (AP Photo/Harvey Georges, File) Alton Lucas delivers wrapped firewood to a convenience store near his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. It's one of the many jobs he performs as part of his Sunflower Landscaping, a business he founded through the program Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Old photos of Alton Lucas, top and bottom on left, and musician DJ Nabs, lower right, are assembled in a scrapbook in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. As a teenager, Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. In the late 1980s, he was already the right-hand man to his musically inclined best friend, Youtha Anthony Fowler, who many hip-hop and R&B heads know today as DJ Nabs. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as DJ Nabs, left, listens to lifelong best friend Alton Lucas talk about his drug addiction in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. By their teenage years, Lucas and Fowler were deejaying for college parties at nearby Duke University. Together, “Luke Duke,” as Lucas was known, and “Nabisco Disco,” as Fowler was called, helped popularize hip-hop music among undergraduates. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) This early 1990's photo provided by musician DJ Nabs shows him, left, with his childhood friend, Alton Lucas in North Carolina. (Courtesy DJ Nabs via AP) Alton Lucas sits on the porch of his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. As a teenager, Alton Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. In the late 1980s, he was already the right-hand man to his musically inclined best friend, Youtha Anthony Fowler, who many hip hop and R&B heads know today as DJ Nabs. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas drives home after dropping some firewood at a local convenience store outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) A photo of Alton Lucas' wife, Bronwyn Lucas, and their children, sits on a desk at his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. His wife, whom he’d met at a fatherhood counseling conference, said his past had barred him from doing something as innocuous as chaperoning their children on school field trips. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this April 9, 1988, file photo, Los Angeles police officers search one of seven people arrested for selling narcotics in the south-central area of Los Angeles, as more than 1,000 police officers raided gang strongholds to attack on drug dealing and street violence in the nation's second largest city. In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs. It is questionable whether anyone won the war. Who suffered the worst losses is clearer: Black Americans, their families and their communities. (AP Photo/Douglas C. Pizac, File) FILE - In this Oct. 11, 1982 file photo, first lady Nancy Reagan speaks at the first national conference of the National Federation of Parents for Drug-Free Youth in Washington. “Many people think drug prevention is ‘just say no,’ like Nancy Reagan did in the '80s, and we know that did not work,” said Becky Vance, CEO of the Texas-based agency Drug Prevention Resources, which has advocated for evidenced-based anti-drug and alcohol abuse education for more than 85 years. (AP Photo/Barry Thumma, File) FILE - In this June 17, 1971, file photo, President Richard Nixon explains aspects of the special message sent to the Congress, asking for an extra $155 million for a new program to combat the use of drugs. He labeled drug abuse "a national emergency" and said the money would be used to "tighten the noose around the necks of drug peddlers and thereby loosen the noose around the necks of drug users." At left is Egil Krogh, deputy director of the Domestic Council. At right is Dr. Jerome Jaffe, who was recruited by Nixon to lead a new drug strategy. (AP Photo/Harvey Georges, File) Alton Lucas delivers wrapped firewood to a convenience store near his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. It's one of the many jobs he performs as part of his Sunflower Landscaping, a business he founded through the program Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as DJ Nabs, left, listens to lifelong best friend Alton Lucas talk about his drug addiction in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. By their teenage years, Lucas and Fowler were deejaying for college parties at nearby Duke University. Together, “Luke Duke,” as Lucas was known, and “Nabisco Disco,” as Fowler was called, helped popularize hip-hop music among undergraduates. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas drives home after dropping some firewood at a local convenience store outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) A photo of Alton Lucas' wife, Bronwyn Lucas, and their children, sits on a desk at his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. His wife, whom he’d met at a fatherhood counseling conference, said his past had barred him from doing something as innocuous as chaperoning their children on school field trips. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this April 9, 1988, file photo, Los Angeles police officers search one of seven people arrested for selling narcotics in the south-central area of Los Angeles, as more than 1,000 police officers raided gang strongholds to attack on drug dealing and street violence in the nation's second largest city. In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs. It is questionable whether anyone won the war. Who suffered the worst losses is clearer: Black Americans, their families and their communities. (AP Photo/Douglas C. Pizac, File) FILE - In this Oct. 11, 1982 file photo, first lady Nancy Reagan speaks at the first national conference of the National Federation of Parents for Drug-Free Youth in Washington. “Many people think drug prevention is ‘just say no,’ like Nancy Reagan did in the '80s, and we know that did not work,” said Becky Vance, CEO of the Texas-based agency Drug Prevention Resources, which has advocated for evidenced-based anti-drug and alcohol abuse education for more than 85 years. (AP Photo/Barry Thumma, File) FILE - In this June 17, 1971, file photo, President Richard Nixon explains aspects of the special message sent to the Congress, asking for an extra $155 million for a new program to combat the use of drugs. He labeled drug abuse "a national emergency" and said the money would be used to "tighten the noose around the necks of drug peddlers and thereby loosen the noose around the necks of drug users." At left is Egil Krogh, deputy director of the Domestic Council. At right is Dr. Jerome Jaffe, who was recruited by Nixon to lead a new drug strategy. (AP Photo/Harvey Georges, File) Alton Lucas delivers wrapped firewood to a convenience store near his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. It's one of the many jobs he performs as part of his Sunflower Landscaping, a business he founded through the program Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Old photos of Alton Lucas, top and bottom on left, and musician DJ Nabs, lower right, are assembled in a scrapbook in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. As a teenager, Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. In the late 1980s, he was already the right-hand man to his musically inclined best friend, Youtha Anthony Fowler, who many hip-hop and R&B heads know today as DJ Nabs. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as DJ Nabs, left, listens to lifelong best friend Alton Lucas talk about his drug addiction in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. By their teenage years, Lucas and Fowler were deejaying for college parties at nearby Duke University. Together, “Luke Duke,” as Lucas was known, and “Nabisco Disco,” as Fowler was called, helped popularize hip-hop music among undergraduates. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas drives home after dropping some firewood at a local convenience store outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) A photo of Alton Lucas' wife, Bronwyn Lucas, and their children, sits on a desk at his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. His wife, whom he’d met at a fatherhood counseling conference, said his past had barred him from doing something as innocuous as chaperoning their children on school field trips. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this Oct. 11, 1982 file photo, first lady Nancy Reagan speaks at the first national conference of the National Federation of Parents for Drug-Free Youth in Washington. “Many people think drug prevention is ‘just say no,’ like Nancy Reagan did in the '80s, and we know that did not work,” said Becky Vance, CEO of the Texas-based agency Drug Prevention Resources, which has advocated for evidenced-based anti-drug and alcohol abuse education for more than 85 years. (AP Photo/Barry Thumma, File) FILE - In this June 17, 1971, file photo, President Richard Nixon explains aspects of the special message sent to the Congress, asking for an extra $155 million for a new program to combat the use of drugs. He labeled drug abuse "a national emergency" and said the money would be used to "tighten the noose around the necks of drug peddlers and thereby loosen the noose around the necks of drug users." At left is Egil Krogh, deputy director of the Domestic Council. At right is Dr. Jerome Jaffe, who was recruited by Nixon to lead a new drug strategy. (AP Photo/Harvey Georges, File) Alton Lucas delivers wrapped firewood to a convenience store near his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. It's one of the many jobs he performs as part of his Sunflower Landscaping, a business he founded through the program Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Old photos of Alton Lucas, top and bottom on left, and musician DJ Nabs, lower right, are assembled in a scrapbook in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. As a teenager, Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. In the late 1980s, he was already the right-hand man to his musically inclined best friend, Youtha Anthony Fowler, who many hip-hop and R&B heads know today as DJ Nabs. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as DJ Nabs, left, listens to lifelong best friend Alton Lucas talk about his drug addiction in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. By their teenage years, Lucas and Fowler were deejaying for college parties at nearby Duke University. Together, “Luke Duke,” as Lucas was known, and “Nabisco Disco,” as Fowler was called, helped popularize hip-hop music among undergraduates. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas drives home after dropping some firewood at a local convenience store outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) A photo of Alton Lucas' wife, Bronwyn Lucas, and their children, sits on a desk at his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. His wife, whom he’d met at a fatherhood counseling conference, said his past had barred him from doing something as innocuous as chaperoning their children on school field trips. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this Oct. 11, 1982 file photo, first lady Nancy Reagan speaks at the first national conference of the National Federation of Parents for Drug-Free Youth in Washington. “Many people think drug prevention is ‘just say no,’ like Nancy Reagan did in the '80s, and we know that did not work,” said Becky Vance, CEO of the Texas-based agency Drug Prevention Resources, which has advocated for evidenced-based anti-drug and alcohol abuse education for more than 85 years. (AP Photo/Barry Thumma, File) FILE - In this June 17, 1971, file photo, President Richard Nixon explains aspects of the special message sent to the Congress, asking for an extra $155 million for a new program to combat the use of drugs. He labeled drug abuse "a national emergency" and said the money would be used to "tighten the noose around the necks of drug peddlers and thereby loosen the noose around the necks of drug users." At left is Egil Krogh, deputy director of the Domestic Council. At right is Dr. Jerome Jaffe, who was recruited by Nixon to lead a new drug strategy. (AP Photo/Harvey Georges, File) Alton Lucas delivers wrapped firewood to a convenience store near his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. It's one of the many jobs he performs as part of his Sunflower Landscaping, a business he founded through the program Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as DJ Nabs, left, listens to lifelong best friend Alton Lucas talk about his drug addiction in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. By their teenage years, Lucas and Fowler were deejaying for college parties at nearby Duke University. Together, “Luke Duke,” as Lucas was known, and “Nabisco Disco,” as Fowler was called, helped popularize hip-hop music among undergraduates. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas drives home after dropping some firewood at a local convenience store outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas drives home after dropping some firewood at a local convenience store outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. “I started the landscaping company, to be honest with you, because nobody would hire me because I have a felony,” said Lucas, whose business got off the ground with the help of Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a national nonprofit assisting people with criminal backgrounds by providing practical entrepreneurship education. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) FILE - In this Oct. 11, 1982 file photo, first lady Nancy Reagan speaks at the first national conference of the National Federation of Parents for Drug-Free Youth in Washington. “Many people think drug prevention is ‘just say no,’ like Nancy Reagan did in the '80s, and we know that did not work,” said Becky Vance, CEO of the Texas-based agency Drug Prevention Resources, which has advocated for evidenced-based anti-drug and alcohol abuse education for more than 85 years. (AP Photo/Barry Thumma, File) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as DJ Nabs, left, listens to lifelong best friend Alton Lucas talk about his drug addiction in Nabs' home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. By their teenage years, Lucas and Fowler were deejaying for college parties at nearby Duke University. Together, “Luke Duke,” as Lucas was known, and “Nabisco Disco,” as Fowler was called, helped popularize hip-hop music among undergraduates. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) The radio in Alton Lucas' pickup is set to his favorite religious station as he does errands around Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. Lucas said he still wonders what would happen for him and his family if he no longer carried the weight of a drug-related conviction on his record. “So occasionally, I would go apply for a job just to make them do the background check. I'm making them come back and tell me what they found. And I want to see how they are going to respond to me. ... It’s almost like a life sentence." (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Musician Youtha Anthony Fowler, known as "DJ Nabs," looks at an old newspaper clipping, top, about his lifelong best friend, Alton Lucas, in his home studio outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Saturday, June 26, 2021. At the height of the war on drugs, Lucas went to jail for a series of robberies he says were committed to feed his crack cocaine habit. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed) Alton Lucas sits on the porch of his home outside of Raleigh, N.C., on Friday, June 18, 2021. As a teenager, Alton Lucas believed basketball or music would pluck him out of North Carolina and take him around the world. In the late 1980s, he was already the right-hand man to his musically inclined best friend, Youtha Anthony Fowler, who many hip hop and R&B heads know today as DJ Nabs. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed)