This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Friday, November 19th, 2021.

I'm Caleb Brown.

Over the past few years, qualified immunity has become a defining issue in criminal justice reform,

and the issue is not going away.

It's a wholly invented judicial doctrine that for the moment

neither the Supreme Court nor Congress wants to change.

Cato Clark Neely reminds us why giving up on ending qualified immunity is simply not an option.

He spoke at the Cato Club meeting in October.

You know, when Cato launched its campaign to eliminate qualified immunity four years ago.

Nobody was talking about it.

Qualified immunity was an obscure legal term relevant only to

ivory tower law professors and policy walks. to Ivory Tower Law Professors and Policy Wanks.

Now everybody's talking about it.

On Capitol Hill, in state legislatures, in gubernatorial debates,

and on the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, USA Today.

Qualified immunity has become one of the defining issues in criminal justice reform.

So what did we at Cato see four years ago

that nobody else did?

One word, accountability.

Anybody who's ever been a parent, a manager, or the owner of a business

understands that you have to have accountability. Without accountability,

there can be no trust, no confidence.

...