U.S. reverses Obama-era move to phase out private prisons

[Adelaide]

Private prisons are problematic on a lot of levels. It makes the criminal justice system a for-profit business.

There needs to be significant reform, and even then I don't think privatized prisons would be a good idea.

[Common]

There should be no such thing as private prisons, there are some things that should not be for profit.

I agree with you completely, privatized prisons in florida, have so many lawsuits piled up they have the state buried.

Substandard food, substandard medical care. Non existent violence controls because of extreme understaffing.

Privatized prisons cut everything that will make them more money.

[Crepitus]

From what I know, which is admittedly limited, I think its a bad idea not to stop privatized prisons.

For example, Rick Scott an fla several years ago made a big push to privatize state prisons, claiming it would save the state alot of money. He is no in the process of taking all the privatized prisons back. Its cost the state a fortune in lawsuits.

The U.S. Justice Department has reversed an order by the Obama administration to phase out the use of private contractors to run federal prisons.
In a memo made public on Thursday, Attorney General Jeff Sessions said the Obama policy impaired the government's ability to meet the future needs of the federal prison system.
The Obama administration said in August 2016 it planned a gradual phase-out of private prisons by letting contracts expire or by scaling them back to a level consistent with recent declines in the U.S. prison population.
It said privately operated prisons were less safe and a poor substitute for government-run facilities.
"The (Obama administration) memorandum changed long-standing policy and practice, and impaired the bureau's ability to meet the future needs of the federal correctional system. Therefore, I direct the bureau to return to its previous approach," Sessions said in a letter dated Tuesday to Thomas Kane, acting director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
Shares of the two leading U.S. private prison companies gained in after hours trading, with GEO Group Inc up 2.15 percent and CoreCivic Inc up 3.44 percent.
Thirteen of the federal government's 146 prisons are privately run. Together, those 13 housed 22,600 inmates as of December 2015, down from about 40,000 in 2014.

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-us...-idUSKBN1622NN

Private for profit prisons are a terrible idea!

Also looks like payback for donations to Trump.Private prisons back Trump and could see big payoffs with new policies

My understanding is their lobbying is largely responsible for the continuation of the war on drugs and mandatory minimum sentencing.

Some things should not be for profit enterprises. This is one, health insurance is another.

[DGUtley]

Donald Trump, bombastic billionaire buffoon, is taking actions as president to benefit corporate America at the cost of the poor? You don't say!

As I read it, Sessions deviated from Trump in this regard. Trump wanted to stop it but Sessions continued it as the BOP had indicated they needed it to continue with operations. "The (Obama administration) memorandum changed long-standing policy and practice, and impaired the bureau's ability to meet the future needs of the federal correctional system. Therefore, I direct the bureau to return to its previous approach," Sessions said in a letter dated Tuesday to Thomas Kane, acting director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

This may be a phase-out situation or a situation to prevent over-crowding. I was for it when it started, but in Ohio it has not worked out so I'd phase it out. Likewise, I'll be surprised if it's not phased our or bigly tweaked. I do want to point out though, that Sessions' overruling of Trump says a lot about the freedom that Trump has given his cabinet appointments to make appropriate decisions (as the official sees it) regardless of Trump's personal opinion.

[MisterVeritis]

There should be no such thing as private prisons, there are some things that should not be for profit.

Why? What does government do better than someone operating from a profit motive?

[Crepitus]

As I read it, Sessions deviated from Trump in this regard. Trump wanted to stop it but Sessions continued it as the BOP had indicated they needed it to continue with operations. "The (Obama administration) memorandum changed long-standing policy and practice, and impaired the bureau's ability to meet the future needs of the federal correctional system. Therefore, I direct the bureau to return to its previous approach," Sessions said in a letter dated Tuesday to Thomas Kane, acting director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

This may be a phase-out situation or a situation to prevent over-crowding. I was for it when it started, but in Ohio it has not worked out so I'd phase it out. Likewise, I'll be surprised if it's not phased our or bigly tweaked. I do want to point out though, that Sessions' overruling of Trump says a lot about the freedom that Trump has given his cabinet appointments to make appropriate decisions (as the official sees it) regardless of Trump's personal opinion.

Considerably predates any of that:

From October 2016

Private Prison Company Bankrolls Pro-Trump Super-PAC

It's unusual for a publicly traded corporation to donate to a super-PAC, but in August, private prison company GEO Group steered $150,000 to Rebuild America Now, a pro-Donald Trump outfit launched by the GOP nominee's longtime friend, developer Tom Barrack.

The timing of the GEO Group's contribution is significant. It cut a $100,000 check to the super-PAC on August 19, the day after the Justice Department announced that it would phase out the use of private prisons. (The company's political action committee donated $50,000 to Rebuild America Now a week before the announcement.)

Also:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...ost-from-trump

[DGUtley]

Considerably predates any of that:

I read it last night. It specifically said that Sessions was countermanding / overruling Trump.

[Crepitus]

I read it last night. It specifically said that Sessions was countermanding / overruling Trump.

That is counter to his actions/words pre election. That's all I know.

[ripmeister]

Why? What does government do better than someone operating from a profit motive?

What a surprise. Veritis is a contrarian.

[Tahuyaman]

The profit motive can create efficiencies and improve outcome. However there are two problems with for profit prisons and they are not mutually exclusive.

1. Society tends to pay a contractor only enough money to warehouse prisoners. If you want more, like rehabilitation services the cost increases. But this does make it easy for politicians to blame the contractors.

2. Proper contract administration would elevate poor contractor performance. This is a government wide problem- agency’s tend to ignore contract administration because there are fewer metrics to judge employee performance with.

So the problem is not for profit prisons. The problem is we pay only to warehouse prisoners then do not pay attention to what happens after the contract is awarded.

Inserting reason into this discussion is unwelcome to some.