Congress OKs bill overhauling oversight of troubled federal Bureau of Prisons
The Senate on Wednesday passed legislation to overhaul oversight and bring more transparency to the crisis-plagued federal Bureau of Prisons following reports from The Associated Press which exposed systemic corruption in the federal prison system and increased congressional oversight.
The Federal Prison Oversight Act, which passed the House in May, now heads to President Joe Biden for his signature. It establishes an independent ombudsman for the agency to handle and investigate complaints in the wake of widespread sexual abuse and others criminal misconduct by staffchronic understaffing, escapes And notable deaths.
It also requires the Justice Department’s inspector general to conduct risk-based inspections of all 122 federal prison facilities, make recommendations to address deficiencies, and assign each facility a risk score. Higher-risk facilities would then be inspected more frequently.
Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Gov.) introduced the bill in 2022 when he led an investigation into the Bureau of Prisons as chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee’s Investigations Subcommittee.
Ossoff and the billās two other sponsors, Judiciary Committee Chairman Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Sen. Mike Braun, R-Ind., launched the Senate Bipartisan Prison Policy Working Group in February 2022 amid turmoil at the Bureau of Prisons, much of which was exposed by AP reporting. Reps. Kelly Armstrong, R-N.D., and Lucy McBath, D-Ga., cosponsored the House version of the bill.
In a statement, Ossoff called Wednesday’s approval “a significant milestone” and said his investigation had “revealed an urgent need to overhaul federal prison oversight.”
āAfter all the headlines, scandals and controversies that have plagued the Bureau of Prisons for decades, we are thrilled to see Congress take action to bring transparency and accountability to an agency that has gone so far without it,ā said Daniel Landsman, vice president of policy for the prisoner advocacy group FAMM.
A request for comment has been left with the Bureau of Prisons.
Under the legislation, the independent prison ombudsman would collect complaints through a secure hotline and an online form, investigate and report dangerous conditions that endanger the health, safety, welfare and rights of prisoners and staff to the attorney general and Congress.
In addition to inspecting prison facilities, the legislation requires the Justice Departmentās inspector general to report findings and recommendations to Congress and the public. The Bureau of Prisons would then have to respond within 60 days with a corrective action plan.
A ongoing investigation by Associated Press has exposed serious, previously unreported deficiencies within the Bureau of Prisons, the Justice Department’s largest law enforcement agency with more than 30,000 employees, 158,000 inmates and an annual budget of approximately $8 billion.
It has emerged from AP reporting dozens of escapeschronic violence, deaths and serious staff shortage That has hampered emergency responsesincluding attacks on prisoners and suicides.
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Associated Press reporter Farnoush Amiri in Washington contributed to this report.