ACLU urging Prez Biden to "use his clemency powers to bring home 25,000 people" from federal prisons

In this post yesterday reviewing commentary on former Prez Trump's use of the clemency power, I mentioned that on this front I am always more eager to look forward than look back.  Consequently, I am pleased to see that via this press release that the ACLU is looking forward and pressing the new President to use his clemency powers boldly.  Here are excerpts:

On Tuesday, the Biden administration announced a slate of executive orders on racial justice. Notably missing was any executive action to boldly use his power of clemency. Today, the American Civil Liberties Union launched a six-figure advertising buy asking President Biden to honor his commitment to significant decarceration by immediately using his clemency authority to help tens of thousands of people in federal prison who could be safely released immediately.

A poll released by the ACLU last year found widespread support for executive officials to use their clemency authority to correct past injustices.... “The American public, voters, and most importantly, incarcerated people and their families were encouraged by President Biden’s commitment to reduce our country’s prison population significantly. Now that he is in office, the president has the opportunity to act on this commitment and correct the harms created by decades of racist policies that have led to the unjust and disproportionate incarceration of Black and Brown people by using his executive power to grant clemency to thousands of people,” said Cynthia Roseberry, deputy director of the ACLU’s Justice Division and former project manager for the Obama administration’s 2014 Clemency Initiative. “Clemency provides an opportunity for the Biden administration to show mercy to those who are incarcerated, repair injustices, and mend communities most impacted by mass incarceration. The new administration must commit itself to the routine and bold use of clemency.”

Specifically, the ACLU is asking President Biden use his clemency powers to bring home 25,000 people in some of our most vulnerable populations including individuals who are currently incarcerated under statutes that have since changed, older people and medically vulnerable people, particularly people at risk of COVID-19 infections, and people incarcerated for drug offenses. Collectively, these categories add up to tens of thousands of people currently incarcerated in the federal prison system.

I am quite pleased that the ACLU is making a big, big ask in this way, but I think it critical for everyone to also be pushing Prez Biden to just get his clemency pen flowing ASAP in even modest ways.  Though it would be amazing to see thousands of commutations in short order, Prez Biden could send a powerful signal by simply making a regular habit of commuting, say, a few dozen sentences every week while also encouraging all the nation's governors to do the same. 

If Prez Bden would just grant 10 clemencies each week (with perhaps five pardons and five commutations), he would set a record-setting pace for the use of the historic clemency power.  According to the latest BOP data, there are over 10,000 federal prisoners aged 60 or older and over 66,000 in for drug offenses; surely five can be found among this group each week who could safely be released from confinement.  There are hundreds of thousand of Americans still bearing the burdens of a long-ago federal conviction, surely five can be found among this group each week who deserve a pardon.

Interestingly, though not properly attributed to anything done by the Biden Administration, the federal prison in the last week has increased by over 400 persons.  Last week, BOP reported the federal prison population at 151,646; today, BOP reports that it stands at 152,071.  This reality provide an important reminder that, absent proactive and sustained effort to decarcerate, the federal punishment bureaucracy may often be lkely to drive up prison populations.