U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff said America’s prisons are an enormous civil and human rights failure.
The Georgia senator joined “Politically Georgia” on Friday to discuss his recent effort to strengthen oversight of the federal Bureau of Prisons.
“A bipartisan investigation into our federal prison in Atlanta, U.S. Penitentiary Atlanta, found that for nearly a decade there had been extreme civil and human rights violations, as well as widespread security and public safety failures,” he said.
The bill President Joe Biden signed into law last month puts in place oversight measures for all 122 federal prisons through frequent and unannounced inspections by the Justice Department’s inspector general, who will provide recommendations based on deficiencies in each facility, Ossoff said.
“The corrections officers recognize that when federal prisons are mismanaged, when they’re understaffed, when there’s no accountability for their colleagues who engage in abuse, it puts their safety at risk, it puts their careers at risk, it puts their reputations at risk,” the senator said.
Also under the new law, an independent ombudsman is required to investigate any reported allegations of civil or human rights deficiencies within federal prisons, Ossoff said.
“The Bureau of Prisons has become, over decades, a diseased bureaucracy that not only isn’t capable of knowing what is happening in its own facilities, but also doesn’t know what resources to ask for to solve these problems,” the Georgia Democrat said.
He went on to label Georgia’s state prison system a “disgrace” and urged state lawmakers to address its discrepancies.
“We’ve got people dying, we’ve got people being killed, we have substantial credible evidence of widespread corruption, and it’s a major human rights and public safety crisis that should be among the highest priorities of our state leaders,” Ossoff said.
He also weighed in on Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign.
Ossoff said Harris’ Atlanta rally showed she could draw support from independent and Republican segments of the Georgia electorate.
“The vice president’s coalition here is expanding every day beyond just the confines of the Democratic Party,” Ossoff said.
Read more AJC coverage of prisons
More people died in Atlanta penitentiary than any prison in the US, report finds.
Kemp hires consultants to examine troubled state prison system
Monday on “Politically Georgia”: U.S. Rep. Sanford Bishop, who represents Georgia’s 2nd Congressional District, joins the show.
About the Author
