Cory Booker Leads Senate Judiciary Committee Hearing On Prison Labor

7 months ago

The Senate Judiciary Committee holds a hearing on prison labor.

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Transcript

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00:01:19 >> I'm gonna begin now that Senator Cotton is here.

00:01:21 [SOUND] And I wanna say good afternoon.

00:01:24 I'm really grateful that you all are here for really an important, I think,

00:01:28 constructive discussion.

00:01:30 Welcome to our witnesses who've traveled here to provide testimony to

00:01:34 this subcommittee.

00:01:35 I'm particularly grateful to Ranking Member Cotton for

00:01:37 his perspective on this important topic relating to labor in prisons.

00:01:42 Most Americans really are shocked that they learn that the 13th Amendment,

00:01:46 which formally abolished slavery in our country, excludes incarcerated people.

00:01:51 It's called the Exception Clause,

00:01:52 which was approved by our very Senate Judiciary Committee in 1864.

00:01:57 The language of the Exception Clause lives on not only in our federal

00:02:00 constitution, but also in 16 state constitutions.

00:02:04 Today, almost 150 years after ratification, we're here to discuss the legacy of

00:02:09 this clause and how it impacts the treatment of incarcerated workers in our

00:02:13 nation's prisons and jails.

00:02:16 This hearing is intended to shed light on the real

00:02:19 issues facing the workforce that lives behind bars,

00:02:23 not to end the opportunity to work in prisons.

00:02:26 I wanna emphasize that.

00:02:28 I was grateful in reading the testimony of all of our witnesses

00:02:32 about how everybody understands that work in prisons could be a very

00:02:37 important part of rehabilitation, preparing people for life outside of prison,

00:02:42 and frankly, to help lower recidivism rates.

00:02:46 And I'm glad that from reading the testimony of all four witnesses,

00:02:49 there seems to be some accord in that.

00:02:51 It should be in our goal, really a collective goal in our society,

00:02:55 that people in prison develop the professional skills that set them up for

00:02:58 success once they're released.

00:03:00 But they can only do so within a humane system that honors human dignity.

00:03:05 This goal I know is shared by Republicans and Democrats alike because for

00:03:08 my 25 years in my professional life,

00:03:10 I've worked with people on both sides of the aisle on these issues.

00:03:15 And the reality is that most people that go to prison actually come out.

00:03:19 We saw some draconian measures at times where people said,

00:03:21 why should we have Pell Grants for people in prison?

00:03:24 Well, every dollar we try to take away from investing in education actually costs

00:03:28 taxpayers much more than that in terms of recidivism rates.

00:03:32 Empowering people to take responsibility and

00:03:35 to learn skills is something we support.

00:03:37 What I'm excited about also is that in red states and in blue states,

00:03:42 Nebraska, every single worker in our country is guaranteed

00:03:49 certain protections against exploitation and abuse.

00:03:56 The government guarantees American workers that

00:04:02 their workplace also will be safe and

00:04:06 hazard free and that they will not be

00:04:12 discriminated against in the workplace.

00:04:18 And that they will receive a minimum wage for their labor.

00:04:26 I've been excited recently we've seen bipartisan legislation

00:04:34 from this committee to stop gender discrimination and

00:04:40 recently age discrimination in the workplace.

00:04:45 [BLANK_AUDIO]

00:04:55 >> And the Judiciary Committee in a bipartisan manner is doing even more on

00:05:02 that, these laws do not reach the people who work within the walls of our nation's

00:05:07 jails and prisons.

00:05:08 There are close to 1.2 million people incarcerated in this country.

00:05:13 And today around 800,000 of them have a job.

00:05:16 Incarcerated Americans contribute to our economy by working jobs

00:05:21 that touch many products and goods that we all use and purchase.

00:05:26 They produce and process foods that we eat.

00:05:29 They work in factories manufacturing license plates, traffic signs, uniforms,

00:05:33 and furniture, much of which bears the sought after made in America label.

00:05:39 They also provide critical public services by fighting wildfires,

00:05:43 repairing and maintaining roads, and responding to natural disasters.

00:05:48 And they work in prison facilities to help maintain the operations.

00:05:52 Most of us have no idea how this labor contributes to our nation's economy.

00:05:57 Incarcerated workers around the country produce more than 2 billion in goods and

00:06:02 over 9 billion a year in services, maintaining the prisons in which they live.

00:06:08 Yet an incarcerated worker can earn an averagely hourly wage

00:06:11 of literally a few cents per hour to half a dollar.

00:06:15 In seven states, incarcerated workers are paid nothing for their labor.

00:06:20 They also lack a minimum health and safety standards in their workplaces and

00:06:24 cannot refuse to work even if they are injured or sick,

00:06:27 facing harsh disciplinary consequences I know we're clear about today if they should.

00:06:32 I want to acknowledge that this topic may make some of us uncomfortable.

00:06:36 Many of us bristle when we hear words like slavery and

00:06:39 that the fact that we are causing folks to work who do not want to.

00:06:43 I'm keenly aware that we are at a point in our nation where we can objectively

00:06:48 analyze does this reflect our values, our collective values as a country.

00:06:54 We know that it's hard to reconcile a lot of the practices

00:06:58 with the democratic ideals of our country.

00:07:00 But we must face it together so that we ultimately can address it.

00:07:05 Our prisons should reflect the best of who we are.

00:07:08 They should reflect our values.

00:07:10 And they should, in my strong opinion, be places that are not just for

00:07:17 punishment but for rehabilitation and for creating roads of redemption.

00:07:22 I believe the ideals of redemption are very much a part of our nation's

00:07:26 core values and help us create a safer, stronger nation.

00:07:32 By ensuring that incarcerated people receive workplace protections,

00:07:36 that they're compensated fairly, and they're not retaliated against if they

00:07:40 decline work, we can create a system that reflects those values and

00:07:45 builds the vocational skills necessary for people to have successful reentry,

00:07:51 thereby improving public safety.

00:07:53 I look forward to having a productive and constructive conversation.

00:07:57 This extraordinary panel, I'm grateful that you're here.

00:08:00 And with that, I'll turn to my ranking member of the subcommittee,

00:08:03 my colleague from Arkansas, Tom Cotton.

00:08:05 >> Well, unlike Senator Booker, I don't think many Americans would be surprised

00:08:10 or shocked that the 13th Amendment allows prison labor.

00:08:13 It's been there from the very beginning.

00:08:16 It's just as much a part of our Constitution as is any other provision.

00:08:19 I do suspect, though, at this hearing, we're going to hear more from Democratic

00:08:22 senators and their witnesses unfairly attacking our prison systems and

00:08:26 the outstanding men and women who serve in them.

00:08:29 They might even compare prison work programs to slavery.

00:08:33 This is a vicious and ugly smear against the very skilled, brave men and

00:08:39 women who work and serve in our prisons as law enforcement and

00:08:42 correctional officers.

00:08:44 Such talk may be fashionable in faculty lounges and Washington,

00:08:47 D.C. cocktail parties, but

00:08:49 it's wholly divorced from the reality on the ground in our prisons.

00:08:54 Prisons are dangerous places full of dangerous people.

00:08:58 Given nothing to occupy their time, prisoners will usually regress back

00:09:02 to doing what they were sent to prison for in the first place.

00:09:06 Idle hands are the devil's workshop.

00:09:09 Reducing idle time has always been a key policy objective for

00:09:13 prison labor programs.

00:09:15 Almost 100 years ago, this very committee held hearings on prison labor,

00:09:19 just like this one.

00:09:21 The committee issued a report finding that prison work programs help maintain

00:09:24 order inside prisons.

00:09:26 This committee said, quote, or this committee, quote, unanimously conceded

00:09:30 that idleness in prisons breeds disorder and aggravates criminal tendencies,

00:09:35 and concluded that prison work prevents prison violence by replacing idle

00:09:39 time with productive activity.

00:09:42 But it's not just about filling otherwise idle time.

00:09:44 This committee's 1930 report also found that prison jobs help prepare inmates

00:09:49 for life on the outside by teaching them, quote, habits of industry.

00:09:54 Our prison work programs have come a long way since 1930.

00:09:57 Today, many prisons partner with technical college that gives inmates

00:10:01 the opportunity to receive job skill certificates.

00:10:03 Many offer pre-apprenticeship opportunities as well.

00:10:06 Some programs even allow inmates to work for private employers at market

00:10:09 wages, giving them the opportunity to pay off victim restitution,

00:10:13 meet child support obligations, and save money for life after prison.

00:10:18 Contrary to what we'll probably hear today, there's nothing illegal or

00:10:21 unconstitutional about prison labor, even for little or no pay, nor is there

00:10:25 anything immoral about it.

00:10:27 Prison labor is a way for inmates to give something back to the society

00:10:31 they wronged.

00:10:33 American society doesn't owe criminals restitution.

00:10:35 Criminals owe our society restitution.

00:10:38 And if that means scrubbing toilets, mopping floors, or picking up the

00:10:42 garbage, then so be it.

00:10:44 In summary, prison jobs help keep the peace, teach inmates job skills and work

00:10:49 habits, and fulfill the original objectives of prison.

00:10:52 Most prison officials would tell our committee just that, which is why I wish

00:10:56 we had a representative from a prison here today to speak about these

00:10:59 programs.

00:11:00 I had invited a respected representative of the Arkansas prison system to

00:11:04 testify and he had agreed, but after seeing the amended title of this

00:11:08 hearing, which for a few days last week equated prison labor to slavery, he

00:11:12 chose not to attend.

00:11:14 That's very understandable on his part, but it's also unfortunate for us.

00:11:17 If the Democrats were not interested in pursuing an ideological agenda, we

00:11:23 might have learned something today.

00:11:25 In any case, I look forward to hearing from our witnesses.

00:11:29 Thank you, Senator Cotton.

00:11:30 We will now introduce and swear in the distinguished panel of witnesses.

00:11:35 The witnesses will give their opening testimony and senators will have five

00:11:39 minutes for questioning.

00:11:40 I'll briefly introduce the majority witnesses and then I'll ask the

00:11:43 ranking member, Senator Cotton, to introduce the final witness.

00:11:48 Our first witness is Terrence Wynn.

00:11:50 At the age of 16, Mr. Wynn was sentenced to life imprisonment without

00:11:54 parole and ultimately served 30 years of imprisonment after the U.S. Supreme

00:11:59 Court decision in Miller v. Alabama and Montgomery v. Louisiana resulted in

00:12:04 his eligibility for parole.

00:12:07 Mr. Wynn was incarcerated in the Louisiana State Penitentiary, commonly

00:12:11 known as Angola, where he worked on the cotton fields of Angola in culinary

00:12:16 services and as a nurse's aide.

00:12:19 Since his release, Mr. Wynn has become an advocate for prison reform and

00:12:22 serves as the executive director and founder of the Louisiana nonprofit

00:12:27 Priorities Intentions Practical Exchanges, or PIPES.

00:12:33 Our second witness is Jennifer Turner.

00:12:36 Ms. Turner is the principal human rights researcher in the human rights

00:12:39 program at the American Civil Liberties Union.

00:12:42 For more than 16 years, she has conducted documented research and advocacy on

00:12:47 human rights violations in the United States with a focus on the criminal

00:12:51 legal system, policing, economic injustice, and racial injustice in the

00:12:55 United States.

00:12:57 She led a multiyear human rights investigation on incarcerated labor and is

00:13:01 the primary author of Captive Labor, a report co-published by the ACLU and the

00:13:07 Global Human Rights Clinic of the University of Chicago Law School,

00:13:12 documenting the exploitation of incarcerated workers.

00:13:15 Ms. Turner is a graduate of New York University Law School, where she was a

00:13:19 Root-Tilden-Kern Scholar and Yale University.

00:13:24 Our third witness is Professor Andrea Armstrong.

00:13:28 Professor Armstrong is a 2023 MacArthur Fellow and the Dr. Norman C. Francis

00:13:34 Distinguished Professor at Loyola University, New Orleans College of Law,

00:13:39 where she teaches in the related fields of constitutional law, criminal law, and

00:13:45 procedure.

00:13:46 She is a scholar on incarceration law and brings much-needed transparency to

00:13:50 incarceration practices in the United States.

00:13:53 She integrates law, history, public health, and the arts in her efforts to

00:13:57 educate broad audiences about the human costs of incarceration.

00:14:03 Professor Armstrong is a graduate of Yale Law School, the Princeton School of

00:14:06 Public and International Affairs, and New York University.

00:14:11 I'll turn to Senator Cotton now to introduce the final witness, Mr. Charles

00:14:14 Lehman.

00:14:16 Thank you.

00:14:19 Charles Lehman is a Fellow at the Manhattan Institute, where he works on the

00:14:22 Policing and Public Safety Initiative and as a contributing editor of City

00:14:25 Journal.

00:14:26 His work has appeared in outlets including The Atlantic, The Wall Street

00:14:30 Journal, National Affairs, and National Review.

00:14:32 He has discussed public safety policy before the House of Representatives and

00:14:36 the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and at colleges such as Carnegie Mellon and

00:14:40 Cornell.

00:14:41 He is a 2023 and '24 Robert Novak Fellow with the Fund for American Studies.

00:14:47 Before joining the Manhattan Institute in 2021, he was a staff writer at the

00:14:51 Washington Free Beacon.

00:14:53 He's originally from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

00:14:54 He now lives outside Washington with his wife and sons.

00:14:59 Thank you very much.

00:15:00 And now I'm going to ask all the witnesses to please rise and raise your right

00:15:04 hand.

00:15:07 Do you swear or affirm that the testimony you are about to give before the

00:15:11 subcommittee will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so

00:15:15 help you God?

00:15:19 I'm going to mark that everybody said yes.

00:15:21 Let the record show that is the affirmative and you all can sit down now.

00:15:27 And you will each have five minutes for your opening testimony starting with Mr.

00:15:31 Wynn and then proceeding to your left, my right.

00:15:34 Mr. Wynn.

00:15:36 Hello, and thank you everyone for the opportunity to address you today.

00:15:42 My name is Department of Corrections Number 296659, or Terrence Wynn.

00:15:48 A native of the plantation known as Angola by way of Shreveport.

00:15:54 Angola is also known as the Louisiana State Penitentiary, an 18,000 acre prison

00:16:01 larger than the island of Manhattan.

00:16:03 My name change took place on December 25th, 1989, when I was a 16 year old kid

00:16:09 and took the life of Jeffrey Owens and attempted to take the life of DeJuan

00:16:13 Lewis.

00:16:14 For my actions, I was arrested and taken to Shreveport's juvenile detention

00:16:17 center where Judge Gallinger ordered that I be tried as an adult.

00:16:23 I was immediately taken to juvie and left in a one man cell at the Paris

00:16:28 Jail.

00:16:29 For my crimes, Judge Hamilton gave me life without the possibility of parole,

00:16:33 plus 25 years to be served at hard labor.

00:16:37 I heard my mother cry when the judge read the sentence, but I promised her

00:16:41 and myself that one day I would come home.

00:16:44 I was eventually transferred to Angola, at the time one of the bloodiest

00:16:49 penitentiaries in the world.

00:16:51 Upon entering the gates of that former plantation, one sees a beautiful manicured

00:16:55 lawn.

00:16:56 There are flowers and open fields.

00:16:58 For one second, I thought, maybe this wouldn't be so bad.

00:17:03 That second didn't last.

00:17:04 Within a few days, I was transferred to the infirmary where a doctor is in charge of determining

00:17:10 if a person is fit to work the fields.

00:17:13 As a 17-year-old, the doctor confirmed that I was fit to work.

00:17:16 I had never worked a day in my life when I found myself walking out of a gate, rifles

00:17:21 pointed at me, next to a guy that I didn't know.

00:17:25 The line was made up of 125 men.

00:17:28 When the last guy came through the gates, we were counted by the guards, and the field

00:17:32 foreman got on his horse and gave an order, "Walk it out."

00:17:36 The field is a back-breaking work.

00:17:39 Every day, we would walk for miles in excessively hot weather and work sometimes bent over on

00:17:45 our knees without breaks for hours.

00:17:48 We would go in to eat, then out again until the day was finished.

00:17:53 Working in the fields, I was forced to goose pick.

00:17:55 That's picking grass with your hands.

00:17:57 I was forced to dig ditches.

00:17:59 I was forced to cut the levee with a hoe while officers on horses looked over us, holding

00:18:05 rifles.

00:18:06 There were few occasions when the field warden decided to bring the line in early from work.

00:18:11 Those rare occasions happened when one of the horses would fall due to the oppressive

00:18:15 heat.

00:18:16 If a man fell over, we kept working.

00:18:19 If you got injured, you kept working.

00:18:22 Nothing took precedence over going to work.

00:18:25 I witnessed tools fights that led to the death of a man and was kept working until I got

00:18:32 so -- no -- and kept working.

00:18:35 I suffered a back injury at the age of 25, an injury I live with today.

00:18:40 I was forced to work until I got so tired of suffering that I chose to be sent to the

00:18:44 hole.

00:18:45 That's the dungeon of administrative segregation.

00:18:48 I spent 30 years at Angola.

00:18:50 25 of those years I spent working in the field.

00:18:56 I received 75 disciplinary write-ups for aggravated work offense.

00:19:00 This means in layman terms, refusing to work.

00:19:03 I mostly refused to work because of the physical pain, more so than out of a rebellious nature.

00:19:10 I admit, though, every time I was told to pick cotton, I refused to do it.

00:19:15 Every time I chose to go to the dungeon, two cents an hour, eight days a week.

00:19:22 Two cents an hour, eight hours a day, five days a week.

00:19:26 That is the pay that decided -- that makes us human and not slaves.

00:19:32 Those two cents never made me feel better than how I know my ancestors felt.

00:19:37 I felt humiliated every time I had to use the restroom in the field.

00:19:42 Every time a horse defecated in my path as I walked to a work site.

00:19:46 Every time a guard refused to let me use the restroom with threats of writing me up.

00:19:50 Every time a whitefield farmer called the whole line "ends" or "boys."

00:19:55 And every time a guard took their hangout on me while I worked.

00:19:59 Was the modern version of slavery better for me than it was for my ancestors?

00:20:04 Two cents is what separates 17th century slavery and 21st century slavery.

00:20:10 The dungeon replaces the whip as punishment.

00:20:13 The dungeon is a place of humiliation where you're stripped of all your possessions and

00:20:18 placed in a jumpsuit.

00:20:21 You can only have a toothbrush and toothpaste, nothing else.

00:20:26 Because you and your thoughts and the sounds of people losing their minds or fighting or

00:20:29 being beaten to death.

00:20:32 After 25 years being forced to work in fields, I was assigned as a tail walker, a job that

00:20:37 forces you to be an inmate guard.

00:20:39 The job requires me to walk up and down the extended lockdown tills for hours.

00:20:46 Making sure that no one was trying to commit suicide.

00:20:49 You become a security guard and a mental health worker while being labored as a rat.

00:20:53 I also attended the culinary school of arts in Angola.

00:20:57 And once I completed the course, I became a kitchen worker.

00:21:00 My last job was a nurse's aide, a job that changed my life forever.

00:21:05 Taking care of people who were dying and could no longer take care of themselves, showing

00:21:09 care and compassion for guys in their final days, that truly changed me.

00:21:13 30 years of incarceration at hard labor.

00:21:16 I never made more than 16 cents an hour.

00:21:20 It would have been easy to come home and never look back.

00:21:22 But when I was released, I found my old neighborhood plagued with violence and a lack of resources.

00:21:28 So I immediately knew what I needed to do.

00:21:31 I founded my organization, Pipes, priorities, intentions, and practical exchanges.

00:21:36 Our mission was and remains today to make life better for our community members, especially

00:21:41 our youth, while working with formerly incarcerated people in their re-entry process.

00:21:47 Post incarceration syndrome is real and our people need support.

00:21:51 I still think about my family all those years serving time with me.

00:21:55 I think about the families of people who are incarcerated today, all of them directly impacted

00:22:00 as well.

00:22:02 My goal during the work I do is to keep our communities safe and thriving.

00:22:06 I believe we can create a system that does not simply punish perpetrators, but works

00:22:12 with them while investing in our community and taking care of victims.

00:22:16 Thank you.

00:22:17 Thank you, Mr. Wynn.

00:22:18 Ms. Turner.

00:22:19 Chairman Booker, Ranking Member Cotton, and distinguished members of the subcommittee,

00:22:24 on behalf of the American Civil Liberties Union, I thank you for the privilege of testifying

00:22:28 before this subcommittee today.

00:22:30 Incarcerated labor has a long and problematic history in the United States rooted in racial

00:22:34 oppression.

00:22:35 The roots of modern-day prison labor programs can be traced to the end of the Civil War

00:22:38 and the passage of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which outlawed slavery and involuntary

00:22:43 servitude except as punishment for a crime.

00:22:46 During this gaping loophole, states turned to incarcerated labor as a means of partially

00:22:50 replacing chattel slavery in the free labor force slavery provided.

00:22:53 Today, our nation incarcerates over 1.2 million people in state and federal prisons, and two

00:22:58 out of three of these incarcerated people are also workers.

00:23:02 In most instances, the jobs these people in prisons have look similar to those of millions

00:23:05 of people working on the outside.

00:23:07 They work as cooks, janitors, and groundskeepers, or in laundries and factories.

00:23:12 Outside the prison walls, incarcerated people provide vital public services, such as repairing

00:23:16 roads, fighting wildfires, or clearing debris after hurricanes.

00:23:19 They cultivate and harvest crops, some on penal plantations situated on land that was

00:23:23 originally the site of slave plantations.

00:23:26 But there are two crucial differences.

00:23:29 Incarcerated workers are under the complete control of their employers, and they've been

00:23:32 stripped of even the most minimal protections against labor exploitation and abuse.

00:23:36 From the moment they enter the prison gates, they can be forced to work.

00:23:40 More than 76% of incarcerated workers report that they're required to work or face additional

00:23:44 punishment, such as solitary confinement, denial of opportunities to reduce their sentence,

00:23:49 and loss of family visitation.

00:23:50 Illness, injury, disability, or a physical inability to work often does not relieve them

00:23:55 of work duties.

00:23:56 U.S. law explicitly excludes incarcerated workers from the most universally recognized

00:24:00 workplace protections, including health and safety laws.

00:24:03 Incarcerated people sometimes work in dangerous industrial settings or hazardous conditions

00:24:07 that would be closely regulated and monitored if they were not incarcerated.

00:24:11 Incarcerated workers are assigned work in unsafe conditions without the standard training

00:24:14 or protective gear provided in workplaces outside prisons.

00:24:17 In numerous cases we documented nationwide, serious injuries and deaths could have been

00:24:21 prevented with proper training, machine guarding mechanisms, or personal protective equipment.

00:24:27 Incarcerated workers are not covered by minimum wage laws and are paid on average 13 to 52

00:24:31 cents per hour in non-industry jobs.

00:24:33 More than 80% have maintenance jobs that support the operation of the prison facilities and

00:24:37 are compensated at the lower end of prison pay scales.

00:24:40 In seven states, incarcerated people are paid nothing at all for most jobs.

00:24:44 Even if an incarcerated worker earns pennies, these low wages are not theirs to keep.

00:24:48 Across the country, prisons deduct as much as 80% from an incarcerated people's paychecks

00:24:53 for room and board and legal financial obligations.

00:24:55 In the federal prison system, 59% of the wages earned by incarcerated workers employed in

00:24:59 the federal prison industries program was deducted by the federal government.

00:25:04 Prison systems charge incarcerated people exorbitant costs for basic necessities like

00:25:07 phone calls home, decent food, hygiene products, and medical care.

00:25:11 Families, many of whom are impoverished themselves, spend an estimated $2.9 billion a year on

00:25:16 commissary accounts and phone calls.

00:25:18 Over half of these families are forced to go into debt to afford the costs of a relative's

00:25:21 conviction and subsequent incarceration.

00:25:24 However, someone is profiting in the American prison system.

00:25:28 Incarcerated workers produce real profits for state prisons and state governments, the

00:25:31 primary beneficiaries of forced prison labor.

00:25:34 Recently incarcerated workers produce more than $2 billion a year in goods and commodities

00:25:38 and over $9 billion a year in services for the maintenance of the prisons where they're

00:25:41 warehoused.

00:25:42 The captive labor system of American prisons hides the staggering cost of our country's

00:25:46 bloated prison system.

00:25:49 The promise of providing incarcerated people with transferable skills and work experience

00:25:52 for their eventual reentry into society often proves illusory.

00:25:56 In reality, the vast majority of work programs in prisons involve menial and repetitive tasks

00:26:00 that provide workers with no marketable skills or training.

00:26:04 Prison industry's jobs and vocational training programs are declining.

00:26:07 Studies show that people who had some savings when they leave prison and got jobs after

00:26:11 the release were less likely to recidivate than those who did not.

00:26:14 We all have an interest in prison work being something beyond pure punitive exploitation.

00:26:19 Yet, despite the potential for prison labor to facilitate rehabilitation, the existing

00:26:23 system very often offers nothing beyond exploitation.

00:26:27 It does not have to be this way.

00:26:29 Work in prisons could be truly voluntary.

00:26:32 Conditions could be safe.

00:26:33 Jobs could provide incarcerated people with marketable skills and vocational training

00:26:36 that will help them to find employment after release.

00:26:40 Incarcerated workers should be paid a fair wage that enables them to save for the future,

00:26:43 support their families, and sets them up for successful reentry.

00:26:47 To move in this direction, we first must end forced labor without exception by repealing

00:26:51 federal and state constitutional exception clauses and guarantee incarcerated workers

00:26:55 the standard labor protections available to other workers in the United States, including

00:26:59 minimum wages, overtime pay, health and safety standards, unionization and collective bargaining,

00:27:05 and protection from discrimination and retaliation.

00:27:08 These recommendations are incorporated into the legislation led by Senator Booker, and

00:27:11 the ACLU has endorsed each of these bills.

00:27:14 Thank you for the opportunity to testify today and provide background and context for the

00:27:17 subcommittee's important work.

00:27:20 Thank you very much, Ms. Turner.

00:27:21 Mr. Lehman.

00:27:22 Thank you, Senator, and thank you to the committee for the opportunity to address you.

00:27:29 As you're aware, there are some 1.2 million people in American prisons today.

00:27:34 Ninety-five percent will eventually return home.

00:27:37 A key question for today's hearing is whether their work in prison will prepare them for

00:27:42 that return.

00:27:44 I am an analyst of public policy.

00:27:46 I am not here to speak to the legal or normative merits of prison labor.

00:27:50 Rather, I want to make a simple argument.

00:27:53 Prison labor makes offenders more employable post-release and thus less likely to reoffend.

00:27:58 Consequently, prison labor should be viewed as part of rehabilitation, not an impediment

00:28:03 to it.

00:28:05 Many criminals reoffend.

00:28:06 Among a cohort of prisoners released in 2008, two-thirds were rearrested within three years,

00:28:12 reducing recidivism benefits offenders, taxpayers, and society at large.

00:28:16 The relationship between crime and employment is not straightforward.

00:28:21 Nonetheless, some evidence indicates that employment conditions affect recidivism risk.

00:28:27 One study of four million prisoners found that those released into worse labor market

00:28:31 conditions are more likely to reoffend, all else equal.

00:28:34 Data on 1.7 million Californian releasees repeats this finding, specifically showing

00:28:39 employment in construction manufacturing reduced recidivism.

00:28:43 Why might employment reduce recidivism?

00:28:45 Most obvious reason is that illicit wages discourage criminal employment.

00:28:49 Research finds that more money reduces risk of property but not violent crime, consistent

00:28:54 with the model in which property crime and work substitute.

00:28:58 Beyond the simple relationship, employment might impose pro-social norms, relieve social

00:29:01 pressures, or simply limit opportunities for offending.

00:29:05 The employment-recidivism relationship is particularly important in the context of incarceration.

00:29:11 Incarceration's effect on recidivism is complex.

00:29:14 Nonetheless, when incarceration causes recidivism, it is likely by making the offender less employable.

00:29:21 One widely cited analysis of Texas data found that incarceration caused significant increases

00:29:25 in reoffending, reduced subsequent employment and earnings, and increased dependence on

00:29:29 public welfare.

00:29:31 Analysis of a cohort of Hungarian offenders provides similar evidence on prison's effect

00:29:34 on employment.

00:29:35 Why does incarceration reduce employment?

00:29:38 Most obviously, a criminal record scares off employers.

00:29:42 In one recent survey of nearly 1,000 U.S. businesses, less than 40% were willing to

00:29:46 hire someone with a criminal record.

00:29:49 Employment prevents recidivism, and if prison can increase recidivism by reducing employment,

00:29:54 crime control policy must help those returning from prison to get jobs.

00:29:58 How can we do this?

00:30:00 One popular solution is to make it harder for employers to discriminate against ex-offenders.

00:30:04 Many states have implemented policies that automatically expunge records, prohibit asking

00:30:07 applicants with a criminal background.

00:30:09 Fortunately, these policies do not have their intended effects and can harm otherwise disadvantaged

00:30:13 non-offenders.

00:30:15 Research on Massachusetts's Ban the Box Law found that it actually decreased ex-offenders'

00:30:19 employment.

00:30:20 The law has also increased discrimination against black men.

00:30:24 Research has further found that Banning the Box reduced young black men's employment by

00:30:27 three percentage points and increased the employment gap between white and black applicants.

00:30:31 The evidence is similarly pessimistic for "clean slate" laws.

00:30:35 Recent comprehensive analysis examining three different clean slate initiatives finds that

00:30:39 expungement has essentially no effect on employment on average.

00:30:44 Policymakers therefore should prioritize making offenders employable.

00:30:48 New interventions are as obvious for this purpose as giving people jobs in prison.

00:30:53 Evidence supports this approach.

00:30:55 One analysis of 77,000 Indiana and Tennessee prisoners employed by private firms found

00:31:00 that participation in prison work is associated with significant reductions in recidivism

00:31:03 at the one and two-year marks compared to a matched control group.

00:31:07 Another following a cohort of 6,000 offenders released in Minnesota found that those who

00:31:11 worked were 24 percent more likely than controls to find a job, worked more hours, and had

00:31:17 higher total wages, and the number of hours working was significantly associated with

00:31:21 lower recidivism rates.

00:31:23 There's also benefit to prisoners working outside the prison walls.

00:31:26 Evidence suggests that work release, prisoners being moved to low-security facilities and

00:31:30 being allowed out to work during the day, improves employment outcomes and reduces recidivism

00:31:34 for property but not violent offenders, a finding consistent with the literature previously

00:31:37 discussed.

00:31:39 Other evidence comes from abroad.

00:31:41 Research on Italian offenders found that among those serving more than six months, additional

00:31:46 unskilled work reduced the reincarceration rate by between three and ten percentage points.

00:31:52 Another analysis found that incarceration in Norwegian prisons caused a steep reduction

00:31:56 in reoffense, about 29 percentage points, driven entirely by those who did not work

00:32:01 prior to their incarceration.

00:32:03 That group also saw an increase in future employment and earnings.

00:32:06 To this last, some might object that Norwegian prisons are not like American prisons.

00:32:11 The former generally regarded as unusually humane, the latter as unusually inhumane.

00:32:15 Bracket the fact that evidence from other nations and from US states indicates that

00:32:19 prison labor reduces recidivism.

00:32:22 The basic problem with this view is that it assumes the quality of US prisons cannot be

00:32:25 affected by policy.

00:32:26 There's much we don't know about what works in prison employment.

00:32:29 This is a general problem.

00:32:31 Most federal rehabilitation programming is not evidence-based.

00:32:34 Any reforms to federal prison labor practices should incorporate a commitment to research

00:32:38 on what works.

00:32:40 That said, the evidence suggests that having incarcerated people work makes them more employable

00:32:44 and less likely to reoffend.

00:32:46 On this basis alone, we ought to see prison labor as part of the rehabilitation equation.

00:32:51 Thank you and I look forward to your questions.

00:32:52 Thank you, Mr. Liebman.

00:32:53 Helpful testimony.

00:32:54 Professor Armstrong.

00:32:55 Good afternoon, Chairman Booker, Ranking Member Cotton, members of the subcommittee, and Senator

00:33:04 Kennedy.

00:33:05 Thank you.

00:33:06 I want to thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

00:33:09 And as Senator Booker mentioned, I teach in the areas of constitutional law and criminal

00:33:13 law.

00:33:14 I also research incarceration law and policy.

00:33:18 I have also visited and audited prisons and jails across the country.

00:33:24 In March 2024, Mr. Pharrell Scarborough, an incarcerated worker at Louisiana State Penitentiary,

00:33:30 died after falling from a flatbed truck and being crushed by heavy lockers.

00:33:36 According to the incarcerated witnesses, there were no guardrails or safety straps on that

00:33:41 truck.

00:33:42 And unfortunately, Mr. Scarborough is not the only preventable death that has occurred

00:33:47 in the incarcerated workplace.

00:33:49 The Associated Press has documented deaths and significant injuries, including amputations,

00:33:57 of incarcerated workers across the nation.

00:34:00 In a 2021 Law Review article, "Beyond the 13th," I discussed four key features of the

00:34:06 American incarcerated labor system.

00:34:09 Incarcerated people are forced to work for little or even no pay in some states, in dangerous

00:34:15 working conditions, with little value for themselves, their communities, or in fact,

00:34:22 public safety.

00:34:23 Today, though, I just want to highlight two features of that system.

00:34:27 One, the coercive context in which incarcerated labor occurs.

00:34:32 And two, the lack of legal protection for incarcerated work conditions.

00:34:38 So let's go to the first.

00:34:41 When you are in the 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week custody of your employer, employee discipline

00:34:49 looks different.

00:34:52 It can be much more severe.

00:34:54 If your supervisor, who was also a prison guard, is not pleased by your work or your

00:35:00 job performance, he can send you to solitary confinement.

00:35:04 He can deny you visits with your children or with your spouse.

00:35:10 These prison guard decisions are really difficult to challenge after the fact.

00:35:14 The Prison Litigation Reform Act makes it hard to access federal courts.

00:35:20 And even if you make it to court, legal doctrines defer to prison guard decision-making.

00:35:27 The possibility of severe punishment can also deter incarcerated workers from advocating

00:35:34 for their own safety.

00:35:37 Refusing to work in dangerous conditions could even lead to new criminal charges and new

00:35:44 sentences in some states.

00:35:48 And we, the general public, have no idea.

00:35:52 Because this forced labor occurs in spaces that lack independent oversight, transparency,

00:35:59 and accountability.

00:36:02 The second point I want to emphasize is that incarcerated workers are generally unprotected

00:36:07 by existing employment and workspace law.

00:36:13 Incarcerated workers, especially those who are working for the prison itself on prison

00:36:18 grounds, are often not considered "employees" by federal agencies or by courts.

00:36:28 This is in part because Congress has been silent on the matter.

00:36:34 The lack of workplace protection is compounded by the lack of remedies for job-related injuries.

00:36:40 This coercive context of incarcerated labor, combined with the lack of protection or remedies,

00:36:46 makes incarcerated labor exploitative and dangerous.

00:36:52 Working conditions behind bars can kill and injure incarcerated workers.

00:36:56 It burdens families.

00:36:58 It stretches staff and resources and can undermine a central purpose of incarceration, namely

00:37:05 to ensure that crimes do not reoccur.

00:37:09 But we can choose a different path.

00:37:13 If the goal is better public safety through reducing recidivism, we can make incarcerated

00:37:18 labor look like free labor.

00:37:21 And that will better prepare incarcerated workers for future freedom.

00:37:26 This could include measures to protect incarcerated workers and workplaces, easing access to courts,

00:37:33 and enhancing transparency, including data on work-related injuries and discipline.

00:37:40 In conclusion, incarceration law and incarceration labor touches us all.

00:37:46 Some of us send money to support a loved one behind bars because they only earn pennies

00:37:51 a day.

00:37:53 This hurts rural, poor, and minority communities in particular.

00:38:00 Some of us buy goods from private corporations that were produced with prison labor.

00:38:06 And prisons are also our institutions.

00:38:10 They operate in our name with our tax dollars.

00:38:14 And when incarcerated labor is exploitative, it undermines public trust and legitimacy

00:38:20 of our criminal justice system.

00:38:24 I urge this subcommittee to treat these issues with the urgent attention that they deserve.

00:38:29 Thank you for the opportunity to share my research.

00:38:32 And thank you for holding this hearing.

00:38:35 Thank you, Professor Armstrong.

00:38:37 I'm going to defer to my colleagues who I think may have other places to go, and we'll

00:38:40 start with Senator Padilla.

00:38:43 Thank you, Senator Booker.

00:38:44 Yes, indeed.

00:38:45 We're excited about it.

00:38:46 I'm not going to preempt the announcement, but some good news coming out of the Bureau

00:38:50 of Reclamation at the Department of Interior this afternoon for California water users.

00:38:54 I'll just leave it at that for now.

00:38:56 But I appreciate the flexibility here.

00:38:59 And thank you to all the witnesses for participating today.

00:39:03 To help address the growing wildfire threat facing California, we have long relied on

00:39:08 the Conservation Camp Program, which is our State Department of Corrections volunteer

00:39:15 firefighting program.

00:39:18 The incarcerated individuals who volunteer to join the Conservation Camp Program have

00:39:23 at times comprised up to 40% of the state's total firefighting force.

00:39:28 So it's not insignificant.

00:39:29 And I do want to make it a point to emphasize the voluntary nature of this program.

00:39:37 It's voluntary, but so attractive that we've often seen waiting lists for incarcerated

00:39:43 individuals who want to participate in the program.

00:39:46 Now, many participants in California's firefighting program have described the experience as valuable

00:39:52 for building real life skills.

00:39:55 And more than 300 formerly incarcerated firefighters have used these qualifications and actual

00:40:03 certifications, so it's not just the skills, the training, and the experience, but certification

00:40:10 to go on to earn a job with CAL FIRE, the state's firefighting force.

00:40:15 I think this program can serve as a model for how we help incarcerated individuals develop

00:40:21 useful skills and the necessary certifications to help them find meaningful, well-paying

00:40:27 work post-release.

00:40:29 My first question is for Ms. Armstrong.

00:40:32 How can we build on this model in California to help establish clear links between prison

00:40:37 labor work and opportunities for employment post-release?

00:40:42 One of the most significant features, I believe, of the California system is the fact that

00:40:47 legal roadblocks to people serving as firefighters upon release were removed.

00:40:53 And so when we think about what happens behind bars, the things that people are trained for,

00:40:58 it is also just as important to look at are there barriers to them assuming those professions

00:41:05 and vocations after the fact.

00:41:07 The second thing that I would mention about the California program is something that I

00:41:12 hear from other programs, and I believe Mr. Wynn also mentioned today, which is being

00:41:17 trained in the helping professions, teaching, tutoring, nursing, those professions that

00:41:24 help others can be life-changing in terms of the rehabilitative potential of prisons.

00:41:30 Thank you.

00:41:31 Thank you.

00:41:32 And sort of a follow-up question for Ms. Turner.

00:41:34 Can you speak to the issue of helping incarcerated individuals obtain the necessary certifications

00:41:39 themselves to actually utilize the skills they're developing in a post-release work?

00:41:46 Yes.

00:41:47 Thank you for your question, Senator.

00:41:48 Yes, this is an important feature of vocational programs that will be successful and set people

00:41:53 up for success upon release.

00:41:54 But the reality is that more than 80% of incarcerated workers are engaged in maintenance work.

00:41:59 That isn't setting them up for those jobs.

00:42:02 But certainly the path forward requires us to expand these vocational programs, to expand

00:42:07 job opportunities that can directly lead to work opportunities after release, including

00:42:12 direct lines to employment, letters of recommendation, skills training in industries that are projected

00:42:18 to increase in the workforce.

00:42:19 The reality is that many, even of our vocational programs, are in areas of work that are declining.

00:42:26 Legislative oversight of prison industries programs in Texas and Mississippi, for instance,

00:42:31 found that they were training people in jobs that are little to no job prospects, such

00:42:35 as garment industry manufacturing or farm work.

00:42:40 But there are examples of programs and opportunities here to provide people with the training that

00:42:45 will set them up for gaining stable employment after the release from prison.

00:42:50 So I know there's different types of vocational programs.

00:42:52 You see examples in states across the country.

00:42:55 Coming back to California for a second.

00:42:57 Now, California takes steps to ensure that the wildfire work, which comes with risk,

00:43:02 it's not easy, can be dangerous.

00:43:05 But so it's important to make sure that the program is truly voluntary.

00:43:09 We're not forcing inmates to perform this work.

00:43:14 But often, how often are incarcerated individuals recruited to work jobs and how do we make

00:43:19 sure that they are not being forced to work?

00:43:22 Can you comment on what policies and safeguards should be in place to ensure that it's truly

00:43:29 voluntary and not forced labor?

00:43:31 Sure.

00:43:32 So currently, nearly all states and the federal prison have compulsory work programs and there

00:43:36 are clear punishments levied against people who are unwilling or unable to perform the

00:43:40 job assigned to them, including solitary confinement, denial of good time credits or opportunities

00:43:46 to reduce their sentence and denial of access to call home or have family visitation.

00:43:51 We need to end these punishments.

00:43:54 We also need to amend the 13th Amendment and state exclusion clauses that permit forced

00:44:00 labor and slavery for people convicted of a crime.

00:44:03 But the implementation is important as well.

00:44:06 Ending punishments that are levied against people for inability or refusal to work and

00:44:10 ensuring that when people are unable to work because of a disability, infirmity, age, will

00:44:15 receive permission not to perform the job assigned to them, including people with disabilities.

00:44:22 We need to comply with existing federal disability laws, which most prisons are not doing so,

00:44:26 with respect to job assignments for people with disabilities.

00:44:30 Thank you.

00:44:31 I just wanted to add, California is not alone in using incarcerated workers to fight wildfires.

00:44:35 It's one of at least 14 states that does so and not all these programs are fully voluntary

00:44:39 and we have seen serious injuries and deaths result from this work, both for non-incarcerated

00:44:44 and incarcerated workers.

00:44:46 But when people are desperate to support themselves and need to support themselves while incarcerated

00:44:51 and facing legal financial obligations, that $1 an hour, for instance, in California, is

00:44:57 a very powerful incentive.

00:44:59 And we see some states truly rely on incarcerated workers to perform this work, including, for

00:45:03 instance, Georgia.

00:45:04 One third of counties rely on incarcerated firefighters to respond to motor vehicle accidents,

00:45:10 wildfires, and house fires.

00:45:11 And these workers are not paid a cent for their work.

00:45:14 Thank you.

00:45:15 Thank you, Mr. Chair.

00:45:16 Again, appreciate the accommodation.

00:45:17 Thank you very much.

00:45:18 Senator Cotton.

00:45:19 Ms. Turner, in your opening statement, you called the so-called exception clause of the

00:45:25 13th Amendment a gaping loophole.

00:45:27 Do you believe that is a loophole?

00:45:30 I do.

00:45:31 I do.

00:45:32 It was the foundation of prison labor programs today.

00:45:35 And it led to the labor programs we have today, that we truly have forced labor.

00:45:41 So you think a loophole implies it was unintended or accidental or omission.

00:45:45 You think the people who drafted the 13th Amendment and ratified it didn't know what

00:45:50 they were doing?

00:45:51 Oh, I think it was absolutely intentional.

00:45:53 And it allowed for the use of incarcerated people to replace this free labor force provided

00:45:59 by chattel slavery.

00:46:00 We saw it in some states, for instance, in Texas, following the passage of the 13th Amendment.

00:46:04 The state of Texas purchased 10 plantations and began running them as prisons, some of

00:46:08 which still run today.

00:46:12 Did prisons use labor before the 13th Amendment was passed?

00:46:16 Yes.

00:46:17 So it was just continuing a longstanding practice.

00:46:19 It wasn't replacing anything.

00:46:21 It expanded.

00:46:22 It expanded.

00:46:23 It allowed for the expansion of prison labor programs, and in fact, became so lucrative

00:46:27 that it led to passage of laws such as the Black Codes that encouraged the reincarceration

00:46:32 of black men on specious charges to continue to work in prisons and to provide profit for

00:46:40 prisons both in the North and in the South.

00:46:43 And it's your testimony that we need to have a constitutional amendment to repeal that

00:46:47 clause?

00:46:48 Yes.

00:46:49 There's no place for forced labor in the United States.

00:46:51 Mr. Layman, as I already mentioned in my opening remarks, in 1930, this committee, quote, "Unanimously

00:46:56 conceded that idleness in prison breeds disorder and that prison jobs help maintain orders

00:47:01 in prison by reducing idle time."

00:47:03 Does modern day research back up that assertion from almost 100 years ago?

00:47:08 In general, yes, although I think it's an under-evaluated question.

00:47:12 The Minnesota study I cited earlier finds that there's a strong association between

00:47:17 the fraction of time spent working and the level of misconduct declining.

00:47:22 That study cites prior research, including, I believe, a study of the federal prison employment

00:47:28 system then called Unicor, which finds that compared to matched controls, people who work

00:47:33 are less likely to engage in misconduct in prisons.

00:47:36 And the causal story is pretty straightforward.

00:47:39 If you're working, it's hard to engage in misconduct.

00:47:42 And the committee back then also found that prison jobs help inmates acquire, quote, "the

00:47:46 habits of industry."

00:47:47 Is that still the case today?

00:47:48 Yes.

00:47:49 And I think the strongest finding in the evidence is that prison labor, even unskilled prison

00:47:54 labor, and this goes back to the study of Italian workers, even unskilled prison labor

00:47:58 increases labor force involvement, increases wages, increases earnings following incarceration.

00:48:05 That to me says if it does nothing else, prison labor is a way to improve people's labor market

00:48:09 outcomes after they leave prison.

00:48:11 Okay.

00:48:12 Senator Booker has a bill that would require prisons to pay inmates the same federal minimum

00:48:16 wage that law-abiding American workers outside prison are entitled to receive.

00:48:21 I want to explore the financial pressures that Americans face today thanks to Joe Biden's

00:48:26 inflationary economy.

00:48:27 Do prison inmates have to pay for rent or mortgage?

00:48:32 Not to the best of my knowledge, Senator.

00:48:33 Do they have to pay for grocery bills?

00:48:35 I don't believe so, Senator.

00:48:36 Car payments?

00:48:37 No, sir.

00:48:38 Insurance payments?

00:48:39 No, sir.

00:48:40 Gas to drive to work?

00:48:41 Not to the best of my knowledge.

00:48:46 And the other daily expenses that most law-abiding American citizens have to worry about?

00:48:51 With certain conspicuous exemptions in some states in general, no, prisoners are not responsible

00:48:55 for those.

00:48:57 If prisons were forced to pay inmates those higher wages, probably a lot higher than what

00:49:03 the current minimum wage is given other democratic proposals, who is ultimately going to be paying

00:49:07 for those higher wages?

00:49:09 In contexts where they're employed by the state or other public entities, the taxpayer

00:49:15 ultimately funds those public entities.

00:49:17 If they're employed indirectly by private employers, then the people who are paying

00:49:21 for those private employers, but that makes their labor much less competitive in that

00:49:25 context.

00:49:26 Okay.

00:49:27 Thank you.

00:49:28 I yield back.

00:49:29 Mr. Kennedy.

00:49:30 Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

00:49:31 Ms. Turner, I want to be sure I understand your testimony.

00:49:38 You think prison labor should be voluntary?

00:49:42 Is that the ACLU position?

00:49:43 Yes.

00:49:45 Okay.

00:49:47 Do you think...

00:49:48 I'm sorry, my microphone was off, if I may answer.

00:49:53 Did you answer yes?

00:49:54 My answer is that the majority of incarcerated workers wish to work, but it is vital that

00:49:58 that work be truly voluntary and that there is no place for forced labor in the United

00:50:03 States.

00:50:04 So that's a yes?

00:50:05 Yes.

00:50:06 Okay.

00:50:07 And you think that prisoners who do work are underpaid?

00:50:10 Is that the ACLU position?

00:50:12 They are underpaid or unpaid.

00:50:13 In your state, many of those workers are unpaid.

00:50:19 Let's take a maintenance worker, which I assume includes people working in the kitchen.

00:50:30 What do you think the starting pay ought to be in my state for a prisoner?

00:50:34 Workers should be paid the minimum wage of the state where they live.

00:50:37 And there are true fiscal arguments in favor of that.

00:50:40 Minimum wage?

00:50:41 Minimum wage, yes.

00:50:45 Do you think prisoners should have a 401(k)?

00:50:52 I think that...

00:50:54 My opinion is not what we're asking about.

00:50:56 I'm here to provide information and context for the committee.

00:50:58 But do you think prisoners should be provided with a 401(k)?

00:51:03 If I may answer, the reality is that if we paid incarcerated workers a minimum wage,

00:51:09 it would have net fiscal benefits for the United States.

00:51:12 Yes, ma'am.

00:51:13 I'm trying to ask you about benefits.

00:51:15 Do you think they should be provided with a 401(k)?

00:51:19 Workers should be eligible to earn into the social safety net.

00:51:22 If they're paid minimum wage, workers will be able to earn into social security benefits

00:51:27 to support themselves.

00:51:28 That does not include a 401(k), but I'm talking about basic social safety net.

00:51:32 Do you think prisoners should be entitled to paid vacation?

00:51:37 Prisoners should be entitled to workers' compensation when they're injured or maimed on the job,

00:51:42 which happens all too often.

00:51:43 So they should be covered under our workers' comp law?

00:51:45 Yes, absolutely.

00:51:46 Workers are working in dangerous conditions.

00:51:47 Should prisoners be allowed to unionize?

00:51:50 Yes.

00:51:51 You believe that too?

00:51:53 Okay.

00:51:54 It's vital that workers...

00:51:55 Should prisoners be provided with health insurance matched by their employer?

00:52:02 Workers should be covered by workplace health and safety guarantees.

00:52:06 But what about health insurance?

00:52:07 Incarcerated people are already guaranteed a basic standard of health insurance.

00:52:11 That is already guaranteed by U.S. law.

00:52:13 They're already guaranteed that, even though the medical care they receive is usually substandard,

00:52:18 and when they're injured, they're on the job, often receive substandard care.

00:52:22 They are already guaranteed by law basic health care protections while incarcerated.

00:52:27 Mr. Winn, what crime did you commit?

00:52:34 Second-degree murder and attempt to second-degree murder.

00:52:37 Okay.

00:52:38 Who did you murder?

00:52:40 Jeffrey Owens.

00:52:42 Jeffrey Owen?

00:52:43 Yes, sir.

00:52:44 Why did you murder him?

00:52:47 I was a 16-year-old kid.

00:52:48 Jeffrey, me and DeJuan had a confrontation, and Jeffrey was an innocent bystander.

00:52:56 Okay.

00:52:57 So you shot Jeffrey by accident?

00:52:59 Yes, sir.

00:53:00 You intended to murder somebody else?

00:53:04 I was defending myself against DeJuan Lewis.

00:53:06 Okay.

00:53:07 Mr. Lewis, you shot at Mr. Lewis?

00:53:10 Yes.

00:53:11 And you missed?

00:53:12 Yes, sir.

00:53:13 And you hit Mr. What was his name?

00:53:15 Mr. Jeff Rowans.

00:53:16 Mr. Owens?

00:53:17 Yes, sir.

00:53:21 Did Mr. Owens have a mother?

00:53:23 I think everybody born in the world has a mother.

00:53:28 Yeah.

00:53:29 But was his mother alive when you killed him?

00:53:32 Yes.

00:53:33 Okay.

00:53:34 Did Mr. Owens have a father?

00:53:36 Yes, sir.

00:53:38 Was he alive when you killed him?

00:53:40 I don't know about his father's...

00:53:42 You never checked?

00:53:43 I mean, as a prisoner in Louisiana, you cannot check on those type of things.

00:53:49 Did Mr. Owens have any brothers or sisters?

00:53:51 Yes, he did.

00:53:52 Okay.

00:53:53 How many?

00:53:54 I don't know.

00:53:55 Okay.

00:53:56 You mentioned that your mother cried when you were sent to Angola.

00:54:03 Do you know how Mr. Owens' mother felt?

00:54:06 Have you ever reached out to them?

00:54:07 May I ask you a question, Senator?

00:54:10 Well, answer mine first.

00:54:11 I would answer yours.

00:54:13 Okay.

00:54:14 And you're asking me questions that an incarcerated person cannot answer.

00:54:18 I don't know what Jeffrey Owens' mother did, but human anatomy tells me that, yes, his

00:54:23 mother had to cry because she lost a son that she brought into the world.

00:54:26 Yes, his father, if he was living, he should have cried.

00:54:29 His brother cried.

00:54:31 Did you ever reach out to Mr. Owens' family?

00:54:34 Sir, you're a senator from Louisiana.

00:54:37 If a person like me that was incarcerated reached out to any person that's a victim,

00:54:44 that's a sentence.

00:54:45 You go to prison for that.

00:54:46 And I was already in prison, so that's a different sentence.

00:54:49 So you couldn't write?

00:54:50 No, by law, you cannot reach out to the victim or the victim's family.

00:54:55 Well, I will tell you, I came today because I thought we were going to have a, and I hoped

00:55:01 we were going to have, a rational discussion based on empirical evidence on a very complex,

00:55:11 nuanced subject.

00:55:12 And frankly, I'm disappointed.

00:55:17 You know, Ms. Turner, Professor, I just don't think these emotional arguments are at all

00:55:23 productive in us trying to solve a problem.

00:55:30 People are in prison for a reason.

00:55:34 I believe in free will.

00:55:36 I get the impression that the ACLU position and the professor's position, I don't know

00:55:41 about Mr. Wynn's position, is that you feel sorry for these folks who are in prison.

00:55:48 I wish they weren't there, too, because, but they're there for a reason.

00:55:51 They've really hurt somebody.

00:55:52 In Mr. Wynn's case, he murdered somebody.

00:55:55 He actually killed somebody by accident.

00:55:58 He meant to kill this person, and he shot this other person.

00:56:03 He could have killed two.

00:56:07 And I'm kind of disappointed, and I just don't think we're going to solve this problem with

00:56:12 emotional arguments from people who don't believe in free will and responsibility.

00:56:19 That's just my point of view.

00:56:22 But I thank you all for being here.

00:56:26 And I'll say this, Professor, I was struck, Professor Armstrong, you keep talking about

00:56:31 coercive context, that the prisoners are working in a coercive context.

00:56:40 It's prison.

00:56:43 Prison is a coercive context, and people are there for a reason.

00:56:51 And I think you're in Lava Land if you don't recognize that.

00:56:56 Sure, you can respond.

00:57:01 Thank you so much.

00:57:02 So I think the point is, in fact, that it is prison, but it is when prison is combined

00:57:09 with being forced to work in certain environments that it can lead to dangerous conditions.

00:57:15 And so I think about -- But you have no empirical evidence of that.

00:57:19 You -- Actually, I think that I do, so another life

00:57:22 of mine is -- We can all share -- I mean, people who work

00:57:26 get hurt sometimes.

00:57:27 Yes.

00:57:28 Whether you're in prison or you're out.

00:57:29 Yeah.

00:57:30 Okay?

00:57:31 So I agree.

00:57:32 What I'm talking about and I think is really important to remember is that our incredible

00:57:37 system of justice will sentence somebody to a certain number of years.

00:57:43 But what they're not sentenced to is to lose a limb or to lose a finger because they're

00:57:49 working on defective equipment, equipment that isn't subject to the same rules.

00:57:54 Really the location of a printing press, whether it's behind the wall or something that is

00:58:01 out in the free world, its location should not determine to what extent it is a regulated

00:58:08 piece of equipment.

00:58:09 And you make a valid point, but I've read some of your writings and some of your work,

00:58:15 and I just get the impression that you almost think we shouldn't have prisons.

00:58:24 That people -- There's no free will that people don't choose to commit crimes.

00:58:32 And then if they do, they shouldn't be held responsible for it.

00:58:35 And I just don't think that's -- You're entitled to that opinion.

00:58:38 It's America.

00:58:39 I don't think I've written that anywhere.

00:58:40 And you're entitled to teach your kids that, but I just don't think that's a -- I don't

00:58:44 think most fair-minded Americans agree with you.

00:58:48 And that's just my opinion.

00:58:49 I'm happy to have this discussion, and I thank my friend Senator Booker for calling it, but

00:58:57 you all seem to forget the fact that we're talking about prison folks and people in prison

00:59:03 for a reason.

00:59:05 And they're there -- No, ma'am, Ms. Turner, I'm going to have my say.

00:59:09 I understand the ACLU position.

00:59:11 I'm glad you're not in charge, because we'd have a lot more people hurt in this country.

00:59:18 Thank you.

00:59:19 I'd love to continue the conversation with you, Senator Kennedy.

00:59:21 You can continue the conversation with me.

00:59:23 I'm grateful for my friend and his sincere questioning.

00:59:26 I want to just jump right in on some of the things that he brought up.

00:59:30 And let's just talk about the worker safety rules that we've done for Americans.

00:59:34 It's called OSHA.

00:59:36 And there are certain things we've done that we think it's horrific if we don't do them

00:59:40 to protect people from everything from the off-gassing of chemicals to, as you said,

00:59:45 a printing press that might have unsafe features.

00:59:49 When you go into prison, those basic worker standards that protect people from all kind

00:59:56 of injury, do they apply in prison?

01:00:02 Professor Armstrong.

01:00:04 So the general rule is we don't expect them to apply, especially for things that are happening

01:00:09 behind the wire.

01:00:10 Now, there are limited circumstances where a state which has adopted its own OSHA Act

01:00:18 can, in fact, choose to cover.

01:00:22 But even then, we see, according to research by the National Employment Labor Project,

01:00:27 that those states have also made a choice not to cover incarcerated workplaces.

01:00:33 And so it really does lead to this anomaly where the same activity, the same equipment

01:00:39 is regulated when it's outside but not inside.

01:00:43 So what statutory protections in general are there for people that are behind bars when

01:00:48 they're working?

01:00:49 Well, I don't think that we have a specific statutory protection, federal or state, for

01:00:57 people who are working behind bars.

01:00:59 And so, again, I agree with some of the general statements of my colleagues that if you've

01:01:05 done a crime, there should be a related punishment.

01:01:09 But work in some environments, like Mr. Wynn was describing, where there's no regulation

01:01:15 of heat for heat exhaustion, for access to water or access to facilities, things that

01:01:23 we would consider putting workers out in those conditions almost torturous to just a human

01:01:28 being.

01:01:29 That's why the advocacy that we're hearing is that there should be some kind of protections

01:01:36 against that kind of extreme punishment.

01:01:40 Is that right?

01:01:42 That's correct.

01:01:43 And I would just mention two additional things.

01:01:45 One is thinking about the provision of safety gear.

01:01:48 And so, for example, there are cases where people have fallen off of roofs because they

01:01:52 didn't have safety belts or toe holds or knee pads.

01:01:56 And so, thinking about not just what rules govern the equipment, but also are they being

01:02:01 provided with safety glasses and safety gear.

01:02:04 I think the other part of it is really thinking about the ways in which what we sentence people

01:02:10 to.

01:02:11 We sentence them to years, not particular injuries, and certainly not to amputations.

01:02:17 Okay.

01:02:18 And, Ms. Turner, I just want to say that you tried to say a few things.

01:02:22 I just want to give you an opportunity to more fully respond, just for the record.

01:02:25 Oh, thank you.

01:02:26 Some of those issues.

01:02:27 Thank you.

01:02:28 Well, Senator Kennedy raised the issue of wages.

01:02:30 He also raised the issue of victims of crime.

01:02:32 And their economic analysis by Edgeworth Economics and Worth Rises shows there's a true fiscal

01:02:38 argument for paying incarcerated workers minimum wage.

01:02:41 To pay them a fair wage would actually generate revenue over the long term.

01:02:46 And it would allow, it would benefit victims of crime who would be paid victim restitution.

01:02:51 Currently incarcerated people are saddled with debts for victim restitution.

01:02:55 They're unable to pay back when they're released from prison, maintain those debts, and struggle

01:03:00 to pay them back.

01:03:01 If incarcerated workers are paid a minimum wage, they'll be able to pay restitution.

01:03:05 That will put money in the hands of victims of crime.

01:03:08 It will also allow them to pay child support and support their families who are currently

01:03:11 going into debt to support their loved one while they're incarcerated.

01:03:15 It will allow incarcerated people to become self-sufficient and to have some savings to

01:03:19 set them up for success upon release.

01:03:21 Studies do show that some savings upon release sets people up for reduced success and reduces

01:03:27 recidivism.

01:03:28 Allows them to gain stable housing, stable employment.

01:03:32 In addition, generates tax revenue when this income is taxed.

01:03:36 And Senator Cotton came up with very common sense.

01:03:38 Well, we make a minimum wage for law-abiding citizens.

01:03:40 They have to pay rent.

01:03:41 They have to pay this.

01:03:42 How do you respond to that, really, what sounded very logical?

01:03:45 The reality is incarcerated workers are currently paid pennies per hour, and they don't even

01:03:49 see that much, as much as 80% are deducted.

01:03:53 And in the majority of states, room and board is one of those deductions.

01:03:58 In the federal PICP program, in which incarcerated workers are employed directly by private corporations

01:04:04 and paid a prevailing wage by law, it's a very small number of workers, but over two-thirds

01:04:08 of their wages are deducted for room and board.

01:04:11 The reality, too, is that incarcerated people are forced to pay incredibly extortionate

01:04:16 sums to stay in contact with loved ones, to buy warm clothing, medication, medical co-pays.

01:04:23 And these fees build up, and their family members who are already impoverished or struggling

01:04:29 from the loss of income from their loved one who's incarcerated have to step into the breach.

01:04:33 And more than half of them go into debt to support their loved ones.

01:04:36 Right, and that's what I wanted to clarify.

01:04:37 I want to shift to Senator Durbin in a second, but that incarcerated people actually do pay

01:04:42 are charged for rent.

01:04:43 Absolutely.

01:04:44 And they are charged for numerous things on top of that.

01:04:47 And should they be making a minimum wage, those charges now seem much more rational.

01:04:53 Yet, at the same time, from sanitary napkins to telephone calls, I've been stunned on my

01:05:01 visits to prisons how much it costs to buy a tampon in prison, a bar of soap, or to call

01:05:07 a child.

01:05:08 It's, as you said, usury rates.

01:05:10 And so this idea that paying minimum wage would be, in some way, giving them lavish

01:05:16 resources is just not true.

01:05:18 In addition to the fact that you are citing the evidence that from victim restitution,

01:05:26 child support payments and more, how many times, and I know this, where a man goes to

01:05:30 prison and has children from a divorced or separated mother who has no help whatsoever

01:05:37 and raises that child in poverty.

01:05:38 I'm very grateful that I'm going to go back to, I will resume because I really, Mr. Wynn,

01:05:43 I thank you for enduring that.

01:05:45 I want to give you some more chance to talk, but I do want to take a break for the chairman

01:05:49 of the entire Judiciary Committee.

01:05:51 I'm grateful that he's here and I want to let him have his questioning.

01:05:56 Thanks Senator Booker for this hearing and thank all of you for attending.

01:05:59 I apologize I was down one floor with the Secretary of State Blinken talking about the

01:06:05 situation in our foreign policy and these conflicts are maddening because I wanted to

01:06:10 be here too and it's a difficult challenge.

01:06:13 I've tried in my time on the Judiciary Committee and the few years that I've been chairman

01:06:19 to have a focus on incarceration.

01:06:23 Much of it stems from an article which I read many years ago by a man named Atul Gawande,

01:06:29 a medical doctor who now is working in the administration, who wrote about the impact

01:06:35 of incarceration and particularly solitary confinement on prisoners, what impact it has

01:06:40 on them as human beings, it will have on many people.

01:06:45 I've kind of taken up that cause with some success, limited success, I wish I would have

01:06:51 been more.

01:06:52 But Mr. Wynn, as I read your life story and what you've been through, 30 years of incarceration,

01:06:57 is that right?

01:06:59 Yes sir.

01:07:00 Starting at the age of 16?

01:07:02 Yes sir.

01:07:03 And now how long have you been out of jail?

01:07:06 Due out of first would be four years.

01:07:08 Four?

01:07:09 Yes sir.

01:07:10 And I see that you're actively involved in a project to try to help others that face

01:07:15 that challenge.

01:07:16 Yes sir.

01:07:17 Tell me about that.

01:07:20 I have an organization called PIPES, which stands for Priorities, Intentions, and Practical

01:07:25 Exchanges, and we do wraparound services for guys that's incarcerated coming home.

01:07:32 We also speak on parole board hearings.

01:07:35 We are assisting filing writs for guys, and we do letter writing campaigns.

01:07:41 We do prior vigils.

01:07:43 We also mentor kids that's facing incarceration or on the trajectory of going to prison, and

01:07:50 we try to re-correct the way that they're thinking so that they don't make the bad decisions

01:07:56 that we made to go to prison.

01:07:58 So we just offer them programming so that they can be better human beings and more productive

01:08:03 human beings.

01:08:04 What is the highest priority for the ex-offender?

01:08:07 What are they looking for when they're finally released?

01:08:15 What's their job?

01:08:21 Nothing else really matters because you're playing catch up.

01:08:24 So the average person, no, everybody that's coming home, they're trying to take care of

01:08:31 themselves.

01:08:32 They come home, a lot of them come home.

01:08:34 If you're coming home on parole, you're coming home with a debt that never stopped, so you

01:08:39 got to pay parole fees.

01:08:42 So you need employment to pay those fees so that you don't go back to jail.

01:08:47 So then you need transportation.

01:08:50 You need a phone for communication to see whether or not you have a job.

01:08:56 And it's hard, especially where I'm from in Shreveport, where second chances are really

01:09:02 not fitted for you.

01:09:04 It's like if you got that ex-offender on your back, you don't really get a job.

01:09:10 So a lot of times we have to make our own jobs.

01:09:15 Ex-offenders in Chicago have some helping hands.

01:09:18 We have a congressman, Danny Davis, who's one of the best in terms of finding ways to

01:09:24 give incarcerated people a second chance.

01:09:27 Many of them flock to the neighborhoods around where he lives.

01:09:31 Many of the churches there are dedicated to it, organizations as well.

01:09:35 Some of these people basically need identification cards so they can prove who they are, because

01:09:41 they've been gone for so long, they don't have a driver's license, they don't have anything

01:09:45 they turn to in that regard.

01:09:47 And I think we ought to go out of our way, if they want it, to give high praise to those

01:09:53 employers who employ the ex-offenders.

01:09:56 I've got some friends of mine who are real estate developers in Chicago who look like

01:10:00 high rollers who care less about the little guy, and they're the first to offer jobs for

01:10:05 these people.

01:10:06 And I think they deserve recognition.

01:10:08 Many of them probably don't want to advertise it, they just want to do it.

01:10:11 And that's the most important part.

01:10:13 Have you seen that kind of cooperation from businesses?

01:10:16 Yes, there's certain businesses that does the same thing.

01:10:22 You know, you really have to just put them a part of your network so that they could

01:10:27 give them.

01:10:28 A lot of times, the job industry, I can speak specifically for Shreveport, because New Orleans

01:10:35 is much better than New Orleans, because New Orleans is more of a city of a second chance.

01:10:40 But Shreveport is just becoming a part of understanding the needs of guys that's coming

01:10:46 home.

01:10:47 So most people that get a yard, more than yards, a lawn service job, it's easy for you

01:10:56 to get, or the trucking industry opens its arms to people.

01:11:03 So guys will go try to get their CDLs if they can pass that test, because that test in Louisiana

01:11:08 is kind of hard.

01:11:10 But guys will go out the way to try to get a trucking job.

01:11:13 Let me just say, my time is finished here and I want to wrap up.

01:11:19 I've kind of had this position for many years, and I stayed at every chance I get.

01:11:24 I believe that every member of Congress, every two years, should do two things.

01:11:29 Visit a foreign country, because I don't believe you come to appreciate your home until you

01:11:33 leave it.

01:11:34 And secondly, visit a prison.

01:11:37 Visit a prison.

01:11:39 We make so many decisions, particularly in the Judiciary Committee, about crime, enforcement

01:11:44 of crime, enforcement of the law, and that sort of thing.

01:11:48 And how we're going to teach somebody a lesson, or make our place, our country safer.

01:11:54 And we're doing it based on an image we saw in a movie somewhere, instead of actually

01:11:59 visiting a prison and sitting down and talking to the women and men who are there.

01:12:04 It'll change your attitude instantly.

01:12:07 I'm glad I had a chance to have a conversation with you today.

01:12:09 Thanks, Mr. Wynn.

01:12:10 Thanks, Mr. Whitman.

01:12:11 Thank you.

01:12:12 Mr. Chairman, before you leave, I just want to share something for the record, and I just

01:12:16 give you so much credit for it.

01:12:17 I came here a decade ago, and the Chairman generously put me under his arm and let me

01:12:24 work with him on criminal justice issues.

01:12:25 That's a lot to put under your arm.

01:12:26 Yeah, it's a lot.

01:12:27 Brought me to the White House in the first weeks I was here to sit around a table with

01:12:32 then President Obama.

01:12:33 So from its peak, just over a decade ago, when I walked into the Senate, over the last

01:12:40 10 years, the prison population is now down in America 20%, representing 40 million fewer

01:12:46 people who've experienced prisons or jails annually.

01:12:49 The black incarceration rate has been halved in those 10 years, and black men now are more

01:12:54 likely to graduate college than to go to prison, which is a reversal from a decade ago.

01:13:00 And this, which again, I want to say for my Republican colleagues, often, you know, correlation,

01:13:05 causation, who knows, but during that same time, crime rates fell farther in the states

01:13:09 that experienced the deepest declines in incarceration.

01:13:13 Your leadership has been extraordinary on that.

01:13:15 The fact that amidst a busy day with a lot of significant meetings going on, thank you

01:13:19 for taking the time.

01:13:20 Thank you.

01:13:21 Thank you, sir.

01:13:22 Thank you.

01:13:23 I want to jump back in, Mr. Wynn, with you, because I just didn't feel that your voice

01:13:30 was coming through in the previous questioning about your experiences, and I appreciate that

01:13:35 you sort of enduring that questioning with good nature.

01:13:39 You clearly know that you committed an awful violent crime at 16 years old.

01:13:45 You were not tried as a 16-year-old.

01:13:48 You were tried as an adult, and you got sentenced not for 30 years.

01:13:51 You got sentenced to life until a Supreme Court, advocated by Republicans and Democrats,

01:13:58 changed this idea that children should not have a lifetime imprisonment.

01:14:03 And so you walked out after coming in at 16 and then spending almost twice that time of

01:14:09 your life in and behind bars.

01:14:13 And you've dedicated your life, as many people I know in Newark and he knows in Chicago,

01:14:17 some of my most effective people in helping to lower recidivism rates are people who are

01:14:23 like you, who come back with a determination to serve.

01:14:27 The lessons you learn, the struggles, the pain, the hardship, the shame that you went

01:14:32 through, you were doing everything you can through your organization to try to make sure

01:14:37 that others don't walk the same path as you.

01:14:39 Is that correct, sir?

01:14:40 Yes, sir.

01:14:41 Thank you.

01:14:42 Now, there's one thing that's very clear to me, and I'm going to ask my colleagues about

01:14:46 this as well, is that we, unlike prisons that we imagine in countries that we demonize sometimes,

01:14:54 we don't believe in torturing prisoners.

01:14:56 Is that correct, Mr. Lin?

01:14:59 I said believe, not in actuality.

01:15:01 We can discuss this in a second.

01:15:03 Yes, sir.

01:15:04 That's true.

01:15:05 No, because I know that a lot of our peer nations call solitary confinement for juveniles

01:15:10 torture because it has proven to have very negative effects on brain development.

01:15:16 The majority of children, like you were when you entered, who commit suicide in prison

01:15:21 are those who have been served time in solitary confinement.

01:15:25 Our own psychological associations call it torture.

01:15:30 For you to spend this time that you iterated to me in the hole, as you called it, that

01:15:35 I imagine, as you said, hearing those screams and the challenges, I imagine that that was,

01:15:41 to you, a very unbearable existence.

01:15:44 Yes, sir.

01:15:47 It was very unbearable.

01:15:50 It makes you question yourself because the first time I was in a hole, which was for

01:15:56 a work-related offense, I was thinking, "Man, how am I going to survive this?"

01:16:04 Because it was real dangerous at that time, but just those cells and people don't realize

01:16:10 that being in solitary confinement, your mind tends to eat off itself because there's nothing

01:16:18 to do.

01:16:19 There's no one with you.

01:16:20 You're by yourself.

01:16:21 As a 17-year-old kid, you got to understand how to live with yourself because you really

01:16:29 don't know yourself at 17.

01:16:31 You look in their walls and these walls starting to close in, but you know these walls aren't

01:16:35 closing in, but they are closing in on you.

01:16:38 You're losing your breath and you have to call for help.

01:16:43 When security come, it's like, "What's wrong?"

01:16:45 You're like, "Man, these walls closing in."

01:16:47 He's like, "Man, you're losing your mind."

01:16:51 You know that you don't think you're losing your mind, but in actuality, you are losing

01:16:57 your mind because those walls aren't closing in, but they are closing in.

01:17:01 This is a hearing on work.

01:17:04 I guess the reason why I'm asking you that is because this idea of the line between work,

01:17:10 building skills, creating soft skills and habits, all of the things I often know working

01:17:16 with young people, that if they don't develop the grit, the determination to wake up at

01:17:20 a certain hour, go to work, those are very valuable skills.

01:17:22 I think the other three folks have said that and it prepares you for life.

01:17:27 I guess I brought up the issue of solitary confinement because it seems like you're making

01:17:32 a choice between two tortures.

01:17:35 Is standing out in the heat without the proper rest or the proper hydration, did you see

01:17:43 visibly people pass out?

01:17:46 Was it on a regular basis or every so often?

01:17:50 This was like daily.

01:17:54 The heat and the exhaustion is going to do something.

01:17:59 You witnessed people regularly through the heat and the exhaustion passing out.

01:18:04 They wouldn't stop the line.

01:18:05 They would keep working.

01:18:07 Only when a horse would pass out would they think they realized at that point, when that

01:18:11 beast did, that this was a time to stop.

01:18:15 In your calculation, because you went into solitary confinement, because you refused

01:18:19 to pick cotton in those conditions, am I right that you felt like this was inhumane treatment

01:18:24 and you were trying to decide what is worse, the hole or those work conditions?

01:18:29 Yes, sir.

01:18:30 Yes.

01:18:31 I will say, Mr. Lehman, again, your testimony, I was cheering parts of it because I think

01:18:36 you and I would agree.

01:18:37 Again, you work for an organization that I have a lot of agreement with at times.

01:18:43 Your data is unassailable in the sense that, and I love that you pulled in Italy and I

01:18:50 think it was Norway, the Avira Institute takes groups over to visit some of these prisons

01:18:57 to look at why they might have better recidivism rates than us and why they might have better.

01:19:02 You weren't affirming here on the record that that kind of work versus, as I visit prisons,

01:19:09 again, my faith is a foundation of who I am, so I think of the prodigal son, I think of

01:19:15 Matthew 25.

01:19:16 I see, so I visit prisons all the time and I see oversubscribed people trying to get

01:19:22 into some of these work programs that really are connected to it.

01:19:26 I interview prisoners, what do you think about these works?

01:19:30 But there must be for you a line between what's constructive and what's dehumanizing, degrading

01:19:36 and potentially dangerous to your health.

01:19:39 I mean, almost certainly.

01:19:41 I would be sort of hard-pressed to draw your bright line, Senator, but that seems reasonable.

01:19:46 Yes, and so I would imagine if I put you in charge, and God, you're thinking to myself,

01:19:51 thank God you're not the President of the United States and didn't call me up to do

01:19:54 this job, but if I put you in charge of the Bureau of Prisons, I imagine from the research

01:19:59 that you've done, you would try to design programs, like we did in a bipartisan way

01:20:03 in the First Step Act, that really are connected to the best evidence of what lowers recidivism

01:20:09 rates.

01:20:10 Yes, and I'd underscore the First Step Act, when it was passed, there was a review of

01:20:15 literature commissioned by the criminologist James Byrd that I cite in here to figure out

01:20:20 which federal prison rehabilitation programs are evidence-based, and his answer was essentially

01:20:25 none of them.

01:20:27 I agree, you want to pick, and you know, I am potentially more sympathetic than other

01:20:32 people on the panel to the idea that menial labor, that helping to keep a prison clean

01:20:36 has a rehabilitative function, I'm less persuaded by the importance of high wages, that said,

01:20:42 yes, you want to order prison labor towards those benefits.

01:20:47 There's a lot that we don't know, and I think there's a lot of space for bipartisan collaboration

01:20:51 on the question of what can we know, because in principle, Senator, left and right should

01:20:56 be able to agree that work is a thing that makes people better if it's good work.

01:21:01 Right, and I wonder, Professor Armstrong, do you sort of agree with what Mr. Lehman

01:21:05 is saying?

01:21:06 Where would you draw the lines?

01:21:07 He doesn't want to draw any bright lines, but I imagine you would.

01:21:11 I think there's a lot of scenarios in which work can actually be something that is valuable

01:21:15 and also can help create order and security within a facility.

01:21:22 I think what's really interesting is in my audits and visits behind the wire, people

01:21:27 actually do not want to sit in their cell for 23 hours a day by themselves.

01:21:32 That is not what they want to do.

01:21:34 Instead, the program that is the most oversubscribed at Angola is the one where they are training

01:21:39 dogs to be helping dogs to assist folks with disabilities who might need additional work

01:21:45 and assistance.

01:21:47 So I think when we think about labor behind bars, one line that I would draw is, is there

01:21:54 the possibility of that person being able to apply for a job, to be able to have some

01:22:00 agency or choice in which job they are training for or learning, and then thinking about the

01:22:05 connections between that and the market outside, as Mr. Lehman talked about.

01:22:09 And Ms. Turner, I just want to get to this issue of recidivism, which you've studied,

01:22:14 and want to give you an opportunity from your data when you look at educational and training

01:22:19 programs that they're one way to set people up for success.

01:22:23 But I don't think we're considering how earning a wage and saving money while incarcerated

01:22:27 is also a part of that in lowering recidivism rates.

01:22:31 Can you talk about that combination between constructive work and actually making some

01:22:36 of a wage as well?

01:22:38 Yes, absolutely.

01:22:39 And I do want to say that the studies on recidivism largely focus on the very narrowest category

01:22:44 of workers, people employed in prison industries jobs, who account for only 6.5% of incarcerated

01:22:49 workers nationwide.

01:22:50 There really aren't studies showing reduced recidivism rates for the types of maintenance

01:22:55 work, janitorial work, kitchen work, laundry work, that the great majority, more than 80%

01:23:01 of incarcerated workers are engaged in.

01:23:02 Many workers are tasked with tasks like digging ditches and cutting grass, and that's not

01:23:08 necessarily going to help them get employment after their release from prison.

01:23:12 And so it's important to distinguish the data here.

01:23:17 And in fact, when we talk about forced prison labor, a great majority of this is not helping

01:23:21 people.

01:23:22 And people are earning very little, very little money, pennies per hour in seven states, no

01:23:26 money at all.

01:23:27 But studies do show that gate money or some savings when people are released from prison

01:23:31 will improve outcomes for people.

01:23:34 If people are paid minimum wage, not only are they able to support their families and

01:23:40 be self-sufficient while incarcerated, and their families won't be resulting in going

01:23:45 into debt as more than half of families with a loved one do, but instead will have some

01:23:49 savings to pay first and last month's rent and have stable housing, be able to potentially

01:23:55 start a business, support themselves while they seek out employment, and higher paid

01:24:00 jobs that provide meaningful skills, vocational training, will lead to better employment.

01:24:07 This is a reality.

01:24:08 This is what the studies show.

01:24:09 This is at least what we know so far.

01:24:12 Both are vitally important.

01:24:14 As it is now, workers not only cannot support themselves while they're incarcerated, but

01:24:18 they leave prison saddled with debts that attach to their criminal conviction, legal

01:24:22 financial obligations that they can't pay while they're incarcerated and struggle to

01:24:27 obtain employment after their release.

01:24:29 I also want to mention we talked about licensing restrictions that bar people from employment.

01:24:34 And California is one example where people working, battling wildfires were initially

01:24:38 barred because of their criminal conviction from working as firefighters.

01:24:42 But the reality is that state licensing restrictions bar many formerly incarcerated people from

01:24:46 engaging in work directly related to the work that they learned and took on while incarcerated.

01:24:52 And these state licensing restrictions often aren't related to their crime of conviction.

01:24:56 It's one thing to say you can't be involved as an accountant if you have a white collar

01:25:00 embezzling conviction, for instance.

01:25:03 But someone who's worked as a hospice aide in prison, who's worked for years tending

01:25:09 to dying and sick incarcerated people may be barred in many states from obtaining work

01:25:15 as home healthcare aides or hospice nurses.

01:25:18 And that's a problem as well.

01:25:19 And while we look to the solutions that ensure people can succeed when they reintegrate into

01:25:24 their families and their communities, we also have to consider ending these barriers to

01:25:28 employment for people after they're released.

01:25:30 That's excellent.

01:25:31 Mr. Winn, you can give firsthand insights of the distinguishing between work.

01:25:35 You had said, I think very compellingly in your testimony, that your experience you had

01:25:40 working your fears, but you worked other jobs, including a tire walker, a culinary school,

01:25:47 and a nurse's aide.

01:25:49 And you said something really profound in your testimony that the nurse's aide position,

01:25:55 you said, I think you used the word, had a transformative impact on your life.

01:25:58 Can you explain that differentiation and the value of working jobs that have an impact

01:26:05 on people after prison?

01:26:10 When you're working in the field, you don't feel like that has any value.

01:26:13 You don't feel like you're going to get out.

01:26:16 You know that you don't want to get out and do that anymore.

01:26:20 When you're working in culinary, now you know that you're setting yourself up to get a good

01:26:27 job after incarceration.

01:26:30 When you get a nurse's aide, you would like for that, if you have a compassion for it,

01:26:36 you would like for that to open up the doors.

01:26:38 But like Ms. Turner said, in Louisiana, being an ex-offender, you really can't get a job

01:26:47 in that field, even though you have the skills to do it.

01:26:52 That door isn't open for you.

01:26:54 But people in prison work, they try to get the skills that'll get them a good job when

01:27:01 they come back into society.

01:27:03 And what do you say to Senator Cotton, who said that cleaning toilets and mopping floors,

01:27:11 it seemed like he was trying to indicate that there's some kind of dignity in that, or it's

01:27:15 important to do.

01:27:18 Maybe we as Americans have no problem with thinking people who've committed heinous crimes

01:27:22 would have to do that stuff.

01:27:24 How do you speak to that?

01:27:26 It's kind of hard to speak to it because he has a fixed mindset.

01:27:35 But anybody that's open-minded know that that's kind of like a degrading job, but it's a job

01:27:43 that people need.

01:27:45 And so when you go in a hotel, you want to walk into a clean hotel room.

01:27:51 So we know that someone that cleans toilets, cleans rooms, that's a job for them.

01:27:56 But when you're coming from incarceration for committing a crime, that's not a job that

01:28:04 you have aspirations to come home and do.

01:28:07 You want to do something more worthwhile.

01:28:10 And I imagine this sense of, I am paying my victim compensation.

01:28:15 I am paying for my children's well-being.

01:28:18 So if those were attached to a salary that was more commensurate with the work, I would

01:28:25 imagine people would want to find that pathway to redemption through that work.

01:28:30 Is that correct?

01:28:31 Oh, yes.

01:28:32 Because the average person that's working in Angola that I can speak specifically about

01:28:37 because I did 30 years of my life there, when a guy moves from making two cent an hour to

01:28:44 making let's say 16 cent an hour, a lot of those guys be saying, man, I'm going to save

01:28:52 this little money to send my daughter something.

01:28:54 I'm going to save this to buy my kids some tennis.

01:28:57 Man, so don't ask me to buy you nothing from canteen because I'm not buying you anything.

01:29:01 I want to send my mom or something.

01:29:03 So they'll save, save, save, save.

01:29:04 It might take them a month to buy whatever it is, two months, three months to do it.

01:29:10 But they feel a sense of being a man because now I can provide something to my kid or I

01:29:17 can provide something to my mother.

01:29:20 And that's big for a person in prison.

01:29:23 Thank you.

01:29:24 Thank you.

01:29:25 Professor Armstrong, as we get ready to close, I just want to ask, is there some points that

01:29:30 you came here to make that you weren't able to make yet?

01:29:35 Thank you for that opportunity.

01:29:37 So I think one thing that's really important is to understand the ways in which we kind

01:29:43 of harm our own goals and our own intentions.

01:29:47 So if the idea is that a person by the end of their sentence has paid their debt because

01:29:53 that is what they are sentenced to, then when they leave the prison, they should be able

01:29:59 to earn a living and return as someone's neighbor.

01:30:03 So there was a reference, I believe, to programs in Norway.

01:30:08 And what I think is remarkable about those programs is that they are really looking at

01:30:13 who comes back to us as a neighbor.

01:30:17 And so we can have debates about what an appropriate sentence is, but in no democratic and transparent

01:30:25 society do we sentence people to a term of years and then say, yes, but it's okay to

01:30:31 kill them or to injure them or for them to have amputated limbs.

01:30:35 That can't be a part of our judicial sentence.

01:30:39 And any sentence that would include that, we would say is barbaric.

01:30:45 And so it's worth thinking about the ways in which we can make incarcerated labor look

01:30:51 as close as possible to free labor, and that will serve all of the goals and purposes that

01:30:57 have been mentioned today.

01:30:58 Thank you.

01:30:59 Mr. Lehman, I'm grateful for you taking the time.

01:31:02 I know this is not easy to come here, but do you have any final words to say?

01:31:11 You should turn on your microphone.

01:31:13 Thank you, Senator.

01:31:15 I appreciate the opportunity.

01:31:17 I think that there's a...

01:31:20 The reality that we have to deal with is that it is easy to wish that people can reintegrate

01:31:26 into society.

01:31:27 It is much harder to accomplish that.

01:31:28 I talked about in my testimony briefly, ban the box laws or clean slate laws and the surprising

01:31:35 non-effect on employment following release.

01:31:38 And a straightforward explanation for that is that it is not necessarily the criminal

01:31:43 record alone that makes it harder for people to get jobs afterwards, that employers are

01:31:48 seeing something different in ex-offenders.

01:31:49 Similarly, it's great when vocational ed works.

01:31:53 On average, vocational ed doesn't work.

01:31:55 It's very hard to get vocational ed right in an incarcerated context.

01:32:00 That doesn't mean that there aren't strategies.

01:32:03 One strategy, if I have 20 seconds for your attention, Senator, the thing I would recommend

01:32:07 you think about is employment insurance for ex-offenders, which in surveys, increased

01:32:14 willingness to hire them by 25%.

01:32:17 And I think it's a totally underexplored policy idea.

01:32:19 There are options on the table.

01:32:21 They all start with admitting that the problem is a lot harder than removing impediments.

01:32:26 It's about taking people who are often profoundly dysfunctional and trying to get them into

01:32:31 a position where they are less dysfunctional.

01:32:33 That's an extremely challenging problem.

01:32:34 To be honest about that, there's really no room for success.

01:32:38 Thank you, Mr. Lehman.

01:32:39 Ms. Turner.

01:32:40 Thank you.

01:32:41 I just want to underscore that prison labor is a unique arrangement.

01:32:46 The employer is the jailer.

01:32:48 The employer has complete control over incarcerated workers.

01:32:51 And incarcerated workers are a uniquely vulnerable workforce.

01:32:53 They've been stripped of basic workplace protections.

01:32:56 They have no say in the work assigned to them.

01:32:58 And there's no oversight or regulation over workplace conditions.

01:33:02 And this leads to predictably awful outcomes, including permanent disability and deaths.

01:33:09 And we also have a tremendous lack of information and data.

01:33:13 I spent years researching this.

01:33:14 And we filed for an information request with every state Department of Corrections and

01:33:18 the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

01:33:19 And only about half of the states responded.

01:33:21 The Federal Bureau of Prisons could not even refuse to tell us the number of incarcerated

01:33:25 workers in federal prisons who are working maintenance jobs.

01:33:28 We know a lot about prison industries programs, which as I've mentioned before is about 6.5%

01:33:33 of incarcerated workers' job assignments.

01:33:36 We know very little about how many people are working.

01:33:39 We are extrapolating from surveys conducted by the Bureau of Justice Statistics.

01:33:44 But there's really a need for more information about injuries workers sustain.

01:33:49 For instance, AP filed FOIA requests for California Prison Industry Authority.

01:33:53 We know that 600 injuries were reported over a four-year period.

01:33:58 But most of those records are redacted.

01:33:59 We know a fair amount.

01:34:00 We know a lot of people were injured, suffered eye injuries because they weren't provided

01:34:04 safety goggles.

01:34:05 But we don't really know about everything that's happening in prison.

01:34:08 We need both legal protections, standard workplace protections, wage and hour protections, the

01:34:15 right to unionize, and the end of forced labor.

01:34:18 We need to end forced labor.

01:34:20 And we need to protect these workers.

01:34:22 Because what is happening today is for many workers is purely exploitative and violates

01:34:28 our human rights commitments.

01:34:29 Thank you very much.

01:34:30 So Mr. Wynn, this is how we're going to do this.

01:34:33 You're going to say your final words.

01:34:35 I'm going to say my final words.

01:34:37 And then I'm going to submit for the record, unless it's an objection, I don't see any

01:34:40 of my colleagues objecting.

01:34:42 A section of a documentary that I think will give more color to your words, frankly.

01:34:48 And then I'm going to gavel out.

01:34:49 Does that sound good, Mr. Wynn?

01:34:51 You, me, video, we're done.

01:34:53 Go ahead, Mr. Wynn.

01:34:55 Okay.

01:34:56 We need to separate punishment from exploitation.

01:35:02 Because to send us a person to life, that's punishment.

01:35:06 You exploit a person by sending them in the fields for no money.

01:35:12 But there are people behind those walls that are mothers and fathers.

01:35:17 We understand that victims have been left.

01:35:21 But those people behind those walls could work, pay the victims.

01:35:26 That's paying the debt to society.

01:35:28 Because we never factored that in.

01:35:29 It's all about punishing, punishing, punishing, punishing.

01:35:32 And it's all about let's let these big businesses get free labor from these guys in prison.

01:35:40 But that's exploitation.

01:35:43 But just look at it from a different angle.

01:35:47 That the guys and the women in prison, that don't work.

01:35:51 And they can pay the victims back so they pay their debt and they can take care of their

01:35:58 families.

01:35:59 We need to understand that those are humans.

01:36:02 But a lot of people don't look at it as those guys and women being humans.

01:36:08 They're prisoners.

01:36:10 So we dehumanize them in ways by just saying prisoner.

01:36:16 Instead of saying Senator Cory Booker is now incarcerated.

01:36:20 No.

01:36:21 413, whatever his number is, that's who it is.

01:36:26 So now don't have any emotional attachments to him.

01:36:29 He's no longer a part of the human race.

01:36:32 But we'll put a dog behind a cage.

01:36:36 We leave a dog in our car and go in the grocery store and come back with the windows up.

01:36:41 We're going to incarcerate the person that left that dog.

01:36:44 So we give more care and concern about that dog than we do with that human being that's

01:36:49 trapped inside of a cell.

01:36:51 When the temperatures are 110 degrees and that tear doesn't get any ventilation and

01:36:57 he's falling out or he dies behind those bars because he committed a crime.

01:37:02 But a crime takes more precedence over the human.

01:37:06 So there's no more human decency when you become a convicted felon.

01:37:11 So we need to just start separating that punishment and that exploitation.

01:37:17 And we need to start understanding and realizing and not forgetting the fact that those are

01:37:22 human beings.

01:37:24 Like Senator Kennedy was asking me about do I think about the mother of the victim.

01:37:30 Of course.

01:37:31 So that's a punishment that I live with every day of my life that he would never understand.

01:37:36 Because when you commit a crime and you really change, you're really remorseful for it.

01:37:41 That's a punishment that you would never, ever overcome.

01:37:45 So I live with a daily punishment that no one can see, that no one can understand but

01:37:50 a person that did it.

01:37:52 So should I be punished for the rest of my life by society also?

01:37:58 Thank you.

01:38:00 You know, Mr. Wynn, I felt uncomfortable when he was questioning you.

01:38:13 And I think it's because exactly what you're saying.

01:38:18 I've watched so many young men, young black men, at these terribly young ages, get engaged

01:38:28 in a world that just has them end up dead or has them end up in prison.

01:38:38 And we deny them, as you said, it almost sounds like a les mis, just their number.

01:38:45 We deny them their humanity.

01:38:48 And we reduce them to the lowest, worst day of their lives.

01:38:56 That's their entire definition.

01:38:58 That one moment that he replayed with you, that becomes the totality of their being.

01:39:04 And we don't see the full human being.

01:39:07 There's not a person in this vaunted Senate chamber right now who hasn't desperately needed

01:39:12 grace in their lives.

01:39:15 And grace by its very definition is unmerited love and kindness.

01:39:20 You didn't deserve this.

01:39:23 And the quality of our grace in this country worries me sometimes.

01:39:29 Because we don't extend it to even an individual like you, who spent decade after decade after

01:39:35 decade in prison for a heinous act you did when you were 16.

01:39:41 You are not, the sum total of who you are is not that crime.

01:39:47 You are every day working to define the totality of who you are.

01:39:54 And these ideals of redemption, these ideals of grace and rehabilitation, and ultimately

01:40:11 the quality that we manifest in our society is as much of a reflection of the people who

01:40:15 are incarcerated as those who are doing the incarcerating us.

01:40:19 What story are we telling about ourselves?

01:40:23 And so I just want to say in particular to you today, your voice here mattered.

01:40:29 Your voice added a lot of clarity.

01:40:32 You are a first-hand person to experience this at a time, as my colleague said, where

01:40:36 most Americans do not go into prisons to see what's really going on, don't sit down to

01:40:42 listen to people we incarcerate.

01:40:46 Well, I don't believe there are any throwaway people.

01:40:50 So I'm grateful for your presence here, as I am for all three of the, all four of the

01:40:57 witnesses.

01:40:58 It is a very important conversation.

01:41:02 The evidence suggests we could do a lot better towards empowering people to recidivate, to

01:41:09 excuse me, to return home and not recidivate, and that we could have a prison system that

01:41:14 does not torture people, harm people, injure people, make them more likely to be sexually

01:41:20 assaulted or discriminated against.

01:41:23 That's what we're striving for.

01:41:25 And anyone who looks at American prisons and jails today and says this reflects the best

01:41:30 of who we are and doesn't need any improvement is just wrong, deeply wrong, and is implicated,

01:41:37 in my opinion, as a barrier to trying to create more substantive evidence-based reforms.

01:41:43 I want to play the video, please.

01:41:56 [Video plays]

01:42:12 I feel like I had became a slave, a product of the convict system, because everything

01:42:18 that I was doing was profiting the prison.

01:42:21 How much did you get paid to come out here?

01:42:24 Two cents an hour.

01:42:25 The money that we made, four cents an hour, and for some reason or another the budget

01:42:32 got cut is injustice.

01:42:35 Many were making pennies an hour.

01:42:38 Some were getting nothing at all.

01:42:40 Others were being contracted out to private companies or taking part in work release programs.

01:42:45 Prisoners can sometimes be punished for refusing to work, even thrown into solitary confinement.

01:42:50 And if they are hurt on the job, they often have little recourse.

01:42:54 They aren't eligible for work release compensation, nor are they protected by other worker safety

01:43:00 laws because they're not considered "employees."

01:43:01 Well, when I first went there, I was sent to the field.

01:43:02 Working in the fields, my first job, everybody's first job, for the field for 25 years.

01:43:13 I was working in the fields.

01:43:16 Pulling up cotton stalks in the field, in the mud.

01:43:20 My hand was bleeding, and I realized that I was the machine.

01:43:25 There's no capital asset or value that is necessarily protected because the idea is

01:43:33 that if a person dies while laboring or in their care, but incarcerated, that the state

01:43:40 will simply fill that bed through its criminal legal system.

01:43:44 I want to thank the ranking member, Senator Cotton.

01:44:07 I want to thank each of our subcommittee members who came today.

01:44:10 I want to thank our subcommittee members that may be submitting questions for the record.

01:44:16 I want to thank the witnesses for testifying today.

01:44:19 I want to remind members of the subcommittee that questions for the record are due a week

01:44:24 from today, Tuesday, May 28th at 5 p.m.

01:44:27 And I ask the witnesses, I know this is a burden with all that you all do, but I ask

01:44:33 the witnesses to respond to those questions, not just in a timely manner, what it says

01:44:36 here, but as thorough as possible.

01:44:39 All of you are extraordinary in your capacity to illuminate this situation.

01:44:45 I ask you to do that.

01:44:47 I want to again thank you for this hearing.

01:44:50 I thought the conversation was constructive and meaningful.

01:44:54 With that, I gavel out.

01:44:56 This meeting is adjourned.

01:44:58 (Gavel)

01:45:00 (Gavel)

01:45:01 [BLANK_AUDIO]

Cory Booker Leads Senate Judiciary Committee Hearing On Prison Labor

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