Sending a better clemency message while shooting the messenger

This new New Republic commentary, fully headlined " Biden’s Conservative Vision on Clemency: Thousands of incarcerated people went home early thanks to a Covid relief program. Why would the Biden administration send them back to prison?," continues the annoying tendency of blaming the Biden folks for threatening to send the home confinement cohort back to prison when it is the law passed by Congress (as interpreted by two Justice Departments) that has created the problem.  Here are excerpts (with links from the original):

The Cares Act ... gave the Bureau of Prisons discretion to send certain people home early.  The process involved a rigorous vetting, to ensure that the people chosen were low risk and had served a substantial part of their sentence, and it was effective: Of roughly 4,400 people released under the program, only 190 were sent back for violations, a strikingly low number given how easy it is to break the terms of home confinement. No serious crimes have been reported.

But before Donald Trump left office, administration lawyers determined that once pandemic emergency measures were lifted, Cares Act recipients would have to return to prison.  And Biden’s Office of Legal Counsel declined to reverse the memo.  Still, advocates were hopeful that Joe Biden would issue mass clemency.  So far, that hasn’t happened, leaving Cares Act people anxious about their future and frustrating criminal justice advocates....

Last week, Politico reported that some case workers are being encouraged to have their Cares clients apply to the Justice Department’s Office of the Pardon Attorney, which sounds promising.  But it also suggests that Biden is wedded to an inefficient process that’s created a backlog of close to 16,000 petitions.... 

It’s not clear whether special considerations will be applied to Cares Act recipients, perhaps allowing them to avoid the long trek through the Justice Department.  In fact, not much is clear at all.  Kevin Ring, president of Families Against Mandatory Minimums, said that outside of some leaks to the media, both Cares Act inmates and their advocates are in the dark.  “It’s a crazy lack of transparency,” Ring said.  “Friday afternoon, there’s a phone call to BOP halfway houses saying, this person should fill out a clemency petition in the next couple of days.  Who?  Why?  What [are] the criteria?”...

Amy Ralston Povah, who runs the CAN-DO Foundation, which helps nonviolent drug offenders, is hopeful but frustrated....  She added that Biden’s vision for who deserves early freedom is exceedingly conservative.  “Nonviolent drug offenders are such a limited category,” Povah said.  “Why are others left out?” 

I share Kevin Ring's concerns about a "crazy lack of transparency," though I want to be hopeful along with Amy Ralston Povah about where this is headed.  But I am frustrated because so many seem content to assail the Biden Administration about a problem that is clearly of Congress's making.  As I explained in this post some months ago, titled "Why aren't there much stronger calls for CONGRESS to fix post-pandemic home confinement problems?",  though Prez Biden could (and I think should) use his clemency authority to extended home confinement for those at risk of being sent back to federal prison post-pandemic, Congress is the body that created the CARES Act home confinement authority, and Congress can and should amend the CARES Act to do extend that authority though a few words in an express statutory provision.  Put simply, this matter is a statutory problem that calls for a statutory fix, and blaming Prez Biden for not fully fixing this problem strike me as shooting the messenger. 

I get especially frustrated by this discourse when it is members of Congress who are the ones urging Prez Biden to fix the statutory problem created by Congress.  As explained in this Hill piece, late last week a new letter from more than two dozen House Democrats called on "President Biden to commute the sentences of thousands who were placed on home confinement."  Frustrations aside, I do like that this new letter has legislators asking Prez Biden to improve the existing and badly broken clemency infrastructure.  Here is a key paragraph from the letter:

In addition to the 4,000 people who have been released to home confinement, there are another 15,752 people who, in the midst of this infectious and deadly pandemic, have pending clemency petitions with no real insight on the best way forward for their case.   Thousands with pending clemency petitions have been waiting for a response for years as their cases have languished during previous administrations, including most recently the Trump administration.  While the Trump administration made an effort through home confinement to reduce the number of people inside of BOP facilities, thousands more have been ignored.  The dismissal of their petitions serves only to demonstrate just how ambiguous and broken our clemency system has become.  We, therefore, implore you to establish an advisory board — independent of the Department of Justice — to streamline and modernize the decades-old clemency process, and provide expeditious review of the thousands of cases awaiting answers to their clemency petitions.  This advisory board must address the racially disproportionate impacts of our criminal-legal system.  There is no reason to wait.

Even though I am never keen to see folks shooting the messenger, I am always pleased to see a better clemency message being delivered in the process.  If the push for clemency for the home confinement cohort ends up helping to get our clemency process improved, all the frustrations may almost be worthwhile.

Some of many prior related posts:

• Notable OLC opinion on "Home Confinement of Federal Prisoners After the COVID-19 Emergency" 
• Spotlighting effectiveness of home confinement under CARES Act and concerns about OLC memo disruption
• Effective review of (just some) issues surrounding home confinement for the Biden Justice Department
• FAMM urges AG Garland to prevent those on home confinement during pandemic from being returning to federal prison 
• Notably advocacy for Prez Biden to use his clemency power to ensure those released into home confinement need not return to prison 
• Why aren't there much stronger calls for CONGRESS to fix post-pandemic home confinement problems?
• Hoping grandmothers and others on home confinement get compassionate consideration
• New York Times reporting Biden Justice Department agrees with OLC memo stating prisoners transferred to home confinement must return to prison after pandemic ends
• Home confinement cohort at risk of being returned to federal prison garnering still more attention (but still little action) 
• Advocacy groups argue to DOJ that OLC home confinement memo is "incorrect" and should be rescinded 
• Senators Durbin and Booker write to Prez Biden requesting "immediate action" to prevent home confinement cohort from facing return to prison 
• Still more attention (and some helpful action) for the home confinement cohort
• Prez Biden reportedly considering, for home confinement cohort, clemency only for "nonviolent drug offenders with less than four years" left on sentence 
• Action beginning on Biden clemency plan for some drug offenders in CARES home confinement cohort 

UPDATE: The PBS Newshour had this recent segment on these matters under the headline "Inmates released to home confinement during pandemic fear ‘devastating’ reincarceration."