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BOSTON (WBZ NewsRadio) — Senators Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey were among lawmakers who sent a letter on Wednesday urging the Department of Justice to stop the use of private jails.
Senator Bernie Sanders and several others also signed the letter asking U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland to comply with President Biden's Executive Order they say prohibits the DOJ from contracting with privately operated jails and prisons.
“We write to express deep concern that the U.S. Marshals Service (USMS) appears to be circumventing President Biden’s Executive Order 14006, which seeks to ‘phase out the Federal Government’s reliance on privately operated criminal detention facilities,’” the senators wrote in the letter. “Despite President Biden’s order that ‘the Attorney General shall not renew Department of Justice contracts’ with private facilities, USMS continues to house roughly one-third of its detainees in these facilities.”
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The senators said that President Biden's Executive Order directed the DOJ not to renew contracts with the private facilities, but that the DOJ has continued to do so anyway. They stated that the DOJ continued to quietly rely on private facilities through the Marshals Service: USMS and that roughly 20,000 of its 63,000 detainees are being held in privately run facilities.
In the letter, lawmakers said the Executive Order was issued more than two years ago, but that USMS has only ended private contracts for seven facilities leaving most of its detainees in private facilities.
Senator Warren's press office said the letter builds on oversight done by the Senate Judiciary Democrats in 2021, as well as reporting by the American Civil Liberties Union.
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