At Tuesday's House Judiciary Committee hearing, Rep. Dan Goldman's (D-NY) criticisms of President Trump's prisons policies led to a rebuke from Rep. Andy Biggs (D-NY).
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00:00From New York, Mr. Goldman.
00:02Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and I would ordinarily appreciate this hearing very much
00:07because the Bureau of Prisons is a critical component of the Department of Justice
00:12that is woefully underfunded and struggling to implement their mission.
00:17But we must be living in fantasy land.
00:20We're trying to have a normal hearing doing oversight of the Bureau of Prisons
00:26when the President and Elon Musk are taking a hatchet to the Bureau,
00:33canceling the collective bargaining agreement for all of the correctional officers,
00:39eliminating retention bonuses for the correctional officers,
00:43while making sure that every masked undercover Gestapo agent with ICE gets a $40,000 bonus.
00:53In fact, the bill you passed last week, the Republicans passed last week,
00:59would give $12 billion in pay increases and bonuses to ICE and CBP
01:06and nothing to the Bureau of Prisons.
01:09And yet my colleagues sit over there acting as if they're really interested
01:14in correcting the Bureau of Prisons and all the problems that we have there.
01:19Then put some money where it is because we all know that's how you correct the problem.
01:26That's how you implement the First Step Act.
01:28That's how you implement and fund the Federal Prison Oversight Act,
01:31a bipartisan bill that we passed last Congress that has not been funded and can't do anything.
01:38You're passing a partisan reconciliation bill.
01:41Bill, you have the purse strings.
01:43And yet we're supposed to sit here thinking that you're really serious about making sure
01:48that we're helping the corrections officer.
01:51It's just bogus.
01:54And let's take the Metropolitan Detention Center in my district in Brooklyn.
01:58Since 2020, there have been 17 inmates that have been killed.
02:04And the staffing shortages are devastating and have been devastating.
02:11There have been numerous, numerous lockdowns simply because there is not enough staff.
02:15So inmates are kept in isolation for multiple days at a time because of staffing shortages.
02:23There was a crackdown by the FBI and the Department of Justice in March.
02:2725 inmates were arrested for all sorts of various smuggling efforts, violence, violent assaults
02:38with scalpels and, as my colleague from Florida said, smuggling cell phones.
02:45There's not enough staff to actually monitor what is going on.
02:50So what did they do at MDC?
02:52Well, under President Biden, they implemented a retention bonus of 35%.
02:58That enabled them to hire 87 additional people for that one location, the most in years and years.
03:09And it decreased lockdowns.
03:11Since August of 2024, there have only been three days of lockdowns due to staff shortages.
03:17So you would think that's a productive way of boosting employment, boosting staffing,
03:25which I think every single one of our witnesses has said is an essential part of addressing the problems in the Bureau of Prisons.
03:36So what does President Trump do?
03:39Gets rid of the retention bonuses.
03:42Gone.
03:43Gets rid of the collective bargaining agreement.
03:45How on earth do you think you're going to increase staffing by taking away all of the correction officers' benefits,
03:54by taking away their retention bonus, which proved to be successful and is necessary,
04:00and yet we're here talking about implementing recidivism programs?
04:06It's a joke.
04:08So, Mr. Biggs, you asked for some action items.
04:11I'll give you some action items.
04:13Can I ask you a question, Mr. Green?
04:15After I give you the action items, I'm happy to have a colloquy.
04:18One, restore the retention bonuses so that we can hire more corrections officers to implement all of the laws
04:24that we want to implement in a bipartisan way and so we can keep the inmates safe.
04:30Two, restore the collective bargaining agreement rather than unilaterally canceling a negotiated collective bargaining agreement
04:37that gives the corrections officers very important protections.
04:42And three, let's fund the First Step Act.
04:45Let's fund the Federal Prison Oversight Act, which has not been funded.
04:48There are three action items that you can take back to Mr. Trump to try to actually address the issues at the Bureau of Prisons,
04:56and I am happy to yield to you.
04:58Yeah, can you tell me, you mentioned that the Brooklyn facility had 17 homicides among inmates from 2020 till what?
05:062024.
05:08What administration controlled BOP that entire time?
05:13Did you do anything?
05:14You didn't do jack crap.
05:16You'll bet.
05:17You have no idea what I did.
05:19Time has expired.