WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama cut short the prison terms
of 214 convicts on Wednesday, the largest number of commutations a U.S. leader
has granted in single day since at least 1900, the White House said.

Obama has now granted a total of 562 commutations during his
presidency, more than the number by the past nine presidents combined, it said.
In Wednesday’s batch, 67 convicts were serving life sentences.

The convicts were serving time for crimes including possession
of crack cocaine and methamphetamine, with intent to distribute. Some were
imprisoned on charges of gun possession.

One of the convicts, James Wright of Baltimore, Maryland, was serving
a 20 year sentence that began in 2006 for possession of crack with intent to
distribute. He will be released in December.

Obama has worked to reform the U.S. criminal justice system and
reduce the number of people serving long sentences for nonviolent drug
offences. It is a rare issue on which Obama gets support from Republican
lawmakers.

For years crack offenders faced stiffer penalties than powder
cocaine offenders, even though the substances are similar at the molecular
level. Critics have said the disparity has unfairly harmed minority and poor
communities.

In 2014, Obama announced the most ambitious clemency program in
40 years, inviting thousands of drug offenders and other convicts to seek early
release. But the program has struggled under a flood of unprocessed cases.

“Our work is far from finished,” White House counsel
Neil Eggleston said about the commutations. Eggleston urged Congress to take
action. “While we continue to work to act on as many clemency applications
as possible, only legislation can bring about lasting change to the federal
system,” he said.

The program automatically
expires when Obama leaves office next January and it is uncertain whether the
next president would continue with a similar plan. Donald Trump, the Republican
candidate in the Nov. 8 election, has championed “law and order” in
his campaign. Democrat Hillary Clinton has called for criminal justice reform.