“It just doesn’t make sense to require a non-violent drug offender to serve 20 years, or in some cases, life, in prison,” Obama said in a blog post.

Many of the convicts had been serving time for crack cocaine. Crack users have for years faced far steeper penalties than users of powder cocaine, even though the two substances are molecularly similar. Critics have said the disparity has unfairly hurt poor African-American communities.

Obama has pushed to reform the U.S. criminal justice system to reduce the number of people serving long sentences for such crimes, and it is one of the few issues for which the Democratic president has received support from Republican lawmakers.

Obama commutes sentences of 58 non-violent drug convicts | Reuters

hmmm