A nation in turmoil, struggling against a pandemic, racial injustice, and an extreme political divide, looked on as President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris were sworn in at the inauguration. But in the depths of the nation’s prisons, something terrible was happening.
Leading up to the inauguration, every federal prison in the United States was placed on lockdown. Administrators said it was done out of an “abundance of caution,” but there’s actually no good reason for this. The real truth is disturbing.
Over 150,000 people were placed in solitary confinement, which is a form of torture – just because. In addition to this, they didn’t tell them it was happening! Instead, they waited until they were in their cells, and then told them afterwards. This needs to be addressed.
Prisons using a method of torture just because they can is unacceptable. They also did this in response to COVID-19, which didn’t stop it from disproportionately impacting and killing people inside prisons. It just added torture on top of it! We know what has to be done.
President Biden has called for an “overhaul on inhumane prison practices” such as solitary confinement. We have to make sure he follows through and abolishes this barbaric practice. The time for prisons and jails to stop doing this is immediately!