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BIDEN THREATENS VETO OF BLACKBURN EFFORT TO CANCEL CARES ACT HOME CONFINEMENT

The White House has threatened to veto a Republican-sponsored Senate resolution that would send about 3,000 federal offenders who were released to home confinement during the COVID-19 pandemic back to prison.

NPR reported yesterday that as early as next week, the Senate could vote on S.J.Res. 47, sponsored by Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and more than two dozen other Republican senators. The resolution would negate Dept. of Justice rules that permit over 3,000 federal prisoners sent to home confinement during the COVID pandemic by the CARES Act to complete their sentences at home absent misbehavior.

The resolution is brought under the Congressional Review Act, legislation passed 27 years ago to create a process for Congress to overturn federal agency rules.

Blackburn’s office told NPR that “the COVID national emergency is over, and criminals need to be behind bars, not on the streets.” NPR reported that DOJ says only 27 of the 13,000 prisoners released to extended home confinement during COVID were rearrested or returned to prison custody for committing a new crime.” Blackburn’s office alleges that some of those 27 people “face charges for assault, drugs and human smuggling,” according to NPR, “but analysts who follow the criminal justice system say the people released during the pandemic have a very low recidivism rate – less than 1%, much smaller than the rate for all federal prisoners, according to government statistics.”

Writing three weeks ago in The Hill, Sarah Anderson of the R Street Institute noted that CARES Act home confinement recidivism “is a less than 0.2 percent recidivism rate, which is less than 1/200th of the federal government’s overall self-reported recidivism rate of 43 percent. Put differently, a staggering 99.8 percent of those sent to home confinement under the CARES Act succeeded in establishing and maintaining law-abiding lives outside of federal brick-and-mortar custody. Advocates of public safety and the rule of law should count that as a bonafide win.”

In a statement of administration policy released Wednesday, the Office of Management and Budget said flatly that President Biden will veto S.J.Res. 47 if it makes it to his desk. OMB cited the extraordinarily low recidivism rate among those released to home confinement and the reduced cost to taxpayers compared to incarceration:

Of the over 13,000 people released to home confinement under the CARES Act, less than one percent have committed a new offense—mostly for nonviolent, low-level offenses—and all were returned to prison as a result. Moreover, since home confinement is less than half the cost of housing someone in prison, this program has saved taxpayers millions of dollars and eased the burden on [Federal Bureau of Prisons] staff so they can focus on the higher risk and higher need people in Federal prison.

Daniel Landsman, Vice President of Policy for FAMM, said, “Our federal prison system is approaching crisis level with understaffing and its ability to properly care for and keep safe both the people who live and the people who work in their facilities… [T]he thought of adding, in one fell swoop, 3,000 or so people back into the population when we’re already struggling to adequately staff and keep people safe just doesn’t make sense to me.”

Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) issued a policy brief last June that declared “CARES Act home confinement has been a resounding success in safely reintegrating individuals into the community without compromising public safety.”

The effect of a Biden veto would probably be to kill S.J.Res. 47. With the Democrats controlling the Senate and the Republicans having a razor-thin majority in the House, the likelihood of both chambers to rustle up a two-thirds majority to override a Biden veto is extremely remote.

S.J.Res. 47, Providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Department of Justice relating to Office of the Attorney General; Home Confinement Under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act (October 30, 2023)

Reason, Biden Threatens To Block GOP Plan To Send 3,000 People Back to Federal Prison (November 30, 2023)

Reason, 11,000 Federal Inmates Were Sent Home During the Pandemic. Only 17 Were Arrested for New Crimes (August 22, 2022)

Dept of Justice, Office of the Attorney General; Home Confinement Under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, 88 FR 19830 (April 4, 2023)

Office of Management and Budget, Statement of Administration Policy: S.J. Res. 47 – A joint resolution providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Department of Justice relating to “Office of the Attorney General; Home Confinement Under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act” (November 30, 2023)

Sen Cory Booker (D-NJ), CARES Act Home Confinement – Three Years Later (June 23, 2023)

The Hill, The Senate should codify — not reject— CARES Act’s home confinement policy (November 9, 2023)

NPR, Hundreds released from prison during pandemic may be sent back under Senate proposal (November 30, 2023)

– Thomas L. Root