At Tuesday's House Judiciary Committee hearing, Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX) decried President Trump's handling of prison policies.
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00:00Ranking member, yes, Ms. Crockett for her opening statement.
00:05Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you so much for your opening.
00:10I think that we are living in a time in which the American people are hoping that we can agree on something, anything in Congress.
00:19And the fact is, the vast majority of your opening statement, I could not disagree with.
00:24The question is, while we agree that there is a problem, let's hope that Congress can do what we are supposed to do, which is agree upon a solution.
00:34Today's hearing could not come at a timelier moment, with this being National Correctional Officers Week.
00:40So thank you to all of our correctional officers.
00:44Today, approximately 35,000 correctional officers and staff are under the control of the Bureau of Prisons.
00:50And during the last 100-plus days of this administration, we've seen just how little Trump cares about the BOP staff's ability to do their job overseeing and protecting roughly 155,000 incarcerated people in our federal prison system.
01:08Having been a former public defender and civil rights attorney, I can tell you that I have seen the inside of a few prisons myself.
01:16I've seen the conditions these individuals are living in.
01:19I've seen the conditions that staff are working under.
01:22And based on my experience, I can tell you correctional officer staff have one of the most difficult jobs, as well as the most dangerous.
01:31And these jobs are now only getting harder.
01:34Just two and a half months ago, Ms. Kathleen Toomey, the Deputy Director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons, testified before Congress that the Bureau had over 4,000 vacant positions that need to be filled.
01:46Yet rather than doing anything to ensure adequate staffing and protect officers and inmates, Trump's Justice Department terminated the Bureau's incentive pay plan, effectively cutting Bureau officers and other employees' pay anywhere between 10 and 25 percent.
02:05This plan, of course, helped to retain and recruit people for jobs within the BOP.
02:11Then on March 27, 2025, Trump issued an executive order eliminating BOP's labor union, which is comprised of roughly 30,000 officers and staff.
02:21All this comes after GAO added BOP to its 2025 high-risk list in January due to all of the problems the BOP is facing.
02:33GAO highlighted BOP's, quote, longstanding staffing challenges present a serious threat to the safety of staff and incarcerated people.
02:43BOP also faces challenges with aging and deteriorating infrastructure, which likewise affects safety.
02:51It also needs improvements in planning for programs to prepare incarcerated persons for release.
02:58Better monitoring and evaluation are needed to improve management of the federal prison system, end quote.
03:05So does Trump take these issues and threats to safety seriously?
03:10Absolutely not.
03:11Instead, he made the deranged, delusional decision over the weekend to open up Alcatraz as a prison that was literally shut down because it was too expensive and too impractical to run.
03:25Honestly, you can't make this stuff up.
03:27Please tell me how any of this makes sense.
03:30Stripping Bureau employees of their collective bargaining rights, cutting pay and benefits at a time where the Bureau was ranked the worst place to work among all federal sub-agencies and offices.
03:42And we have more than 450 offices.
03:45Having staff like prison teachers, cooks, nurses, and monitors being forced to serve as correctional officers because BOP has too few officers to actually do the job.
03:57Wanting to place even more of a strain on the system by trying to house migrants and children in Bureau facilities.
04:05It's absolutely ridiculous.
04:06Let me be clear.
04:07This isn't just a staff issue.
04:09It's a life or death issue.
04:12Reports by the Justice Department's Inspector General detailed how in over a third of the inmate suicides that occurred between fiscal years 2014 to 2021,
04:23BOP staff didn't sufficiently conduct the required inmate rounds or counts to check on the inmates.
04:32Let me tell y'all something.
04:33Realizing this fact took me back.
04:37I don't know what it's like to be a family member and to receive that phone call about your loved one that you would imagine is in one of the safest places ever, regardless of why they are there, and to find out that they somehow committed suicide.
04:53I don't know what it's like to be that loved one, but I do know what it's like to be that attorney and to get that call.
04:59To get the call that one of my clients somehow has managed to unfortunately take his life.
05:07This is unacceptable.
05:09And who knows how many lives could be saved.
05:12And while all of this is bad on its own, let's not forget about the fact that in all of the 120 correctional institutions under the Bureau's control, each needs some kind of repair at any given time.
05:26Like Siegelville Federal Correctional Institution in Texas, for example, which is close to my district.
05:32Six of the eight buildings housing inmates had broken air conditioning units during the summer where temperatures in Texas facilities can reach up to 110 degrees.
05:42And at least one unit topped 149 degrees.
05:47We need to get to the bottom of this and fix this organization before more and more deaths occur.
05:53Today's hearing is one of the few moments where actually I believe we can do something good in Congress, and I hope we do today.
06:00Because at the end of the day, this is about doing what's right.
06:04It's about protecting employees.
06:06It's about protecting lives.
06:07It's about ensuring we give people a second chance at life.
06:11So I want to thank the witnesses for being here today, and I look forward to participating in this important discussion.
06:17Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
06:18I yield back.
06:22I will now recognize the chairman of the Crime Subcommittee from the great state of Arizona, Andy Biggs.
06:28Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
06:30I thank the members of both subcommittees for coming together this morning.
06:34I thank Chairman Van Drew for his opening remarks.
06:37I thank the witnesses for being here.
06:39I appreciate you.
06:39I look forward to your testimony today.
06:42Today's hearing is titled Federal Council.