so overcrowded they inflicted cruel and unusual punishment, Harris fought federal supervision, explaining "I have a client, and I don't get to choose my client." Harris declined to take any position on criminal sentencing-reform initiatives Prop36 (2012) and Prop47 (2014), arguing it would be improper because her office prepares the ballot booklets. John Van de Kamp, a predecessor as attorney general, publicly disagreed with the rationale. In September 2014, Harris's office argued unsuccessfully in a court filing against the early release of prisoners, citing the need for inmate firefighting labor. When the memo provoked headlines, Harris spoke out against it, saying she was unaware that her office had produced the memo. Since the 1940s, qualified California inmates have the option of volunteering to receive comprehensive training from the Cal Fire in exchange for sentence reductions and more comfortable prison accommodations; prison firefighters receive about $2 a day, and another $1 when battling fires. LGBT rights Opposing Prop 8 In 2008, California voters passed Prop8, a state constitutional amendment providing that only marriages "between a man and a woman" are valid. Legal challenges were made by opponents soon after its approval, and a pair of same-sex couples filed a lawsuit against the initiative in federal court in the case of Perry v. Schwarzenegger (later Hollingsworth v. Perry). In their 2010 campaigns, California attorney general Jerry Brown and Harris both pledged to not defend Prop8. After being elected, Harris declared her office would not defend the marriage ban, leaving the task to Prop8's proponents. In February 2013, Harris filed an amicus curiae brief, arguing Prop8 was unconstitutional and that the initiative's sponsors did not have legal standing to represent California's interests by defending the law in federal court. In June 2013, the Supreme Court ruled, 5–4, that Prop8's proponents lacked standing to defend it in federal court. The next day Harris delivered a speech in downtown Los Angeles urging the Ninth Circuit to lift the stay banning same-sex marriages as soon as possible. The stay was lifted two days later. Gay and trans panic defense ban In 2014, Attorney General Kamala Harris co-sponsored legislation to ban the gay and trans panic defense in court, which passed and California became the first state with such legislation. Michelle-Lael B. Norsworthy v. Jeffrey Beard et al. In February 2014, Michelle-Lael Norsworthy, a transgender inmate at California's Mule Creek State Prison, filed a federal lawsuit based