Obama visits prison in reform push

President Obama on Thursday took a trip behind bars to highlight his push to overhaul the nation’s criminal justice system.

When Obama’s motorcade entered the gates of the El Reno correctional institution outside Oklahoma City, he became the first sitting president to visit a federal prison. 

{mosads}Obama met with law enforcement officials, prison staff and six nonviolent offenders who are serving their sentences at El Reno. 

“These are young people who made mistakes that aren’t that different than the mistakes that I made and the mistakes you guys made,” Obama told reporters after his meeting with inmates. “The difference is they did not have kinds of support structures, the second chances, the resources that would allow them to survive those mistakes.”

The president toured one cellblock of the sprawling complex, accompanied by Charles Samuels, director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons, and Ronald Warlick, a correctional officer. 

He walked along the block and peered into a cell, which contained two beds and had tan inmate uniforms hanging from the wall. 

After inspecting the 9-foot by 10-foot cell, Obama said there are “enormous overcrowding issues” in prisons that need to be addressed.

The unprecedented visit capped a week of activity designed to build momentum behind bipartisan proposals to make the criminal justice system fairer for those who end up incarcerated.

Obama on Monday commuted the sentences of 46 federal prisoners convicted of nonviolent drug offenses. The next day, he gave a speech calling on Congress to pass criminal justice reform legislation by the end of the year. 

The president backed changes to reduce the nation’s exploding prison population, better integrate inmates back into society, and improve prison conditions by rooting out rape and restricting the use of solitary confinement. 

Obama and reform advocates have noted that while the United States is home to 5 percent of the world population, it contains almost a quarter of the world’s prison population. 

“I think we have a tendency sometimes … to think it’s normal that so many young people end up in our criminal justice system,” the president said. “It’s not normal. It’s not what happens in other countries.”

In a speech to the NAACP National Convention in Philadelphia on Tuesday, Obama argued against lengthy mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent offenders, saying the punishments are unfair, cost taxpayers too much and have a negative impact on communities of color. 

“This is something that I’ve been thinking about a lot,” Obama said at a news conference on Wednesday. “This huge spike in incarcerations is also driven by nonviolent drug offenses where the sentencing is completely out of proportion with the crime.”

Obama is making his push as Republicans and Democrats in Congress seek to pass proposals that would slash mandatory minimum sentences for certain nonviolent offenders and create new programs that reduces the risk of recidivism. 

The effort has the backing of groups on the left and right, including conservative industrialists Charles and David Koch, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Center for American Progress. 

“I am feeling more hopeful today because even now, when, let’s face it, it seems like Republicans and Democrats cannot agree on anything a lot of them agree on this,” Obama told the audience at the NAACP. 

A prison-reform bill could soon move in the House. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) told reporters Thursday that he “absolutely” would like to see a bipartisan bill authored by Reps. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) and Bobby Scott (D-Va.) come to the floor.

“We’ve got a lot of people in prison, frankly, that in my view really don’t need to be there,” Boehner said. “It’s expensive to house prisoners, sometimes some of these people are in there under what I’ll call flimsy reasons. So I think it’s time we review this process.”

The selection of El Reno as a venue was intended to underscore the president’s push. Around half of the inmates at the medium-security facility are drug offenders, which is roughly proportionate to the entire federal prison population, a White House official said. 

The racial and ethnic makeup of El Reno is also “representative of the federal prison population,” the official said. 

The facility is also home to an evidence-based drug abuse treatment program and a Federal Prison Industries factory, which was created to teach inmates work skills they can use after they are released.

Obama’s trip to the prison will be recorded for a Vice Media documentary on America’s prison system that will air on HBO that includes an interview with Vice founder Shane Smith.

The White House downplayed safety concerns about the president visiting a prison. The building Obama toured was emptied before he arrived.

“There will have to be some unique steps that we’ll take to ensure the safety of the president and others who will be participating in that event,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Monday. Obama called it an “outstanding institution within the system.”

— Updated at 2:27 p.m.