Now more than ever, governments are shifting the costs of mass incarceration onto impacted people and their families. That makes it cheaper for local governments and taxpayers to keep people imprisoned and lines the pockets of private corporations.
Over 530,000 people are incarcerated before trial in the U.S.—not because they’ve been convicted of a crime, and not because a court has determined they’re too dangerous to go free, but because they can’t pay bail. Those without money are locked up after arrest—missing work, medical appointments, and time with their families—while those with money go free. But the evidence overwhelmingly shows that money bail makes communities less safe.
In jails and prisons, private companies have a monopoly on food, telecom, and healthcare services, and necessities are five times more expensive than average. The children and families of those behind bars suffer as well. Many jails bar family visits so that jails and for-profit telecommunications companies can make money on overpriced phone and video calls. And when people are released from jail or prison, they’re often hit with a bill for every night they spent behind bars. This added debt makes successful reentry even more challenging.
Meanwhile, in the immigration system, the Trump administration has gone to new lengths to use money as a weapon, threatening financial penalties to terrorize noncitizens—even those on the path to lawful status—into self-deporting.
These policies have serious consequences for hundreds of thousands of people. If you’re poor, an arrest or even a traffic ticket can mean entering a cycle of oppression and poverty.
The Public Justice Debtors’ Prison Project fights to change these systems and end the criminalization of poverty. Working with allies and affected communities, we use litigation strategically to ensure no one is punished by the criminal justice system simply because they are poor, and to make it harder for the government and businesses to treat incarcerated people and their families as a revenue source to exploit.
And it’s working. As a result of our bail reform work, several California counties no longer jail people arrested for minor, non-violent offenses until arraignment solely because they cannot afford money bail. Thousands of people have been promptly released to their families rather than being jailed, with zero uptick in violent crime. Our “Right to Hug” litigation pressured a Michigan sheriff to end a jail’s cruel policy barring children from visiting their parents—a policy he admitted was adopted just to make money. And a Colorado court found that denying all child-parent contact causes irreparable harm to the children and parents of those detained at the jail.
Please join our fight. If you have a case or issue the Debtors’ Prison Project team should know about, or for more information on how you can support this crucial work, click here. (DPPintake@publicjustice.net)
