Christine Owens, executive director of the National Employment Law Project: “Target is finally doing the right thing by reforming its hiring policies so that qualified job applicants aren’t automatically screened out simply because they have an arrest or conviction from the past.”
I believe she’s lying. Being arrested is NOT the same thing as serving time in prison. I haven’t seen the actual Target form in question, but it appears to ask the applicant if they have “served time in prison.”
This politics of “fairness” is getting absurd. It started with an honorable (if misguided) attempt to force businesses to hire blacks. A private business, one not associated with government, has constitutional rights of freedom of association and private property. The US Constitution only prevents governments from discriminating on the basis of race.
Actually, on this one narrow point, she tells the truth. Arrests are public knowledge too, and can (and have personally) disqualified.