Private Prisons love Trump

Photo–Business Insider

In August 2016, before Trump became our president and fired Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, Yates stated that the Obama administration was starting the phasing out of private prisons for the federal government. Audits and studies revealed that private prisons were not cost effective, but actually provided poor care.

The Office of Inspector General’s 2016 memo on private federal facilities stated:

“Our analysis of data on safety and security indicators found that contract prisons had more incidents per capita than BOP institutions in three quarters of the categories we examined…” The Justice Department concluded that federal private prisons were less safe, secure, and did not save substantial money. This decision does not apply yet to immigration detention facilities or private state prisons.”

The day Yates made her announcement, on August 18, the GEO Group’s stock fell from $21.53 a share to $13.01. Starting in August of 2016, GEO, a major private prison company started giving major contributions to the Trump campaign.

1. GEO Corrections Holdings Inc., a subsidiary of the GEO Group, contributed $100,000 to a pro-Trump PAC, the day after Yate’s statement declaring the phasing out of federal private prisons.

2. On November 1, 2016, GEO contributed another $125,000 to the same pro-Trump PAC.

3. The same GEO subsidiary also contributed $200,000 to the Senate Leadership Fund ( Republican PAC), in September, 2016.

In 2015, The Obama administration rejected a bid by the GEO Group to build a 1,000-bed immigration detention center in Texas that would replace the Facility run by its competitor Core Civic. Last month, the Trump administration reversed the Obama decision and announced that the GEO Group would build the 1000-bed immigration detention center in Texas. It was estimated that the new facility would bring $44 million in annual revenue to GEO.

Our new Attorney General, J. Sessions, announced in March, 2017, that the administration will reverse Obama’s policies and continue to use private federal prisons and private federal detention centers.

By:Bradley Schwartz
Founder of prisonpath.com