Cheap prison labor is used to supply businesses with all sorts of products; but prisoners can be vulnerable to abuse

Prisoners are forced laborers without 13th Amendment
protections. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell, AP)

Less than a decade ago, a New York Times story ran with this headline, "A Small Indiana County Sends More People to Prison Than San Francisco and Durham, N.C., Combined. Why?" The story goes on to explore America's prison belt, which was brimming with rural residents, often sentenced for drug crimes by more conservative courts. But, if sending people away for extensive sentences is a rural answer to crime, residents may want to know what the incarcerated do while serving those sentences.

Angola, Louisiana, is home to the country's largest maximum-security prison, which used to be a Southern slave plantation but is now a vast farming facility with prisoner labor. "Unmarked trucks packed with prison-raised cattle roll out of the Louisiana State Penitentiary, where men are sentenced to hard labor and forced to work, for pennies an hour or sometimes nothing at all," reports Robin McDowell and Margie Mason of The Associated Press. "The cows are bought by a local rancher and then followed by The Associated Press another 600 miles to a Texas slaughterhouse that feeds into the supply chains of giants like McDonald's, Walmart and Cargill."

Prison workers are vulnerable to exploitation and abuse. "If they refuse to work, some can jeopardize their chances of parole or face punishment like being sent to solitary confinement," McDowell and Mason write. "They also are often excluded from protections guaranteed to almost all other full-time workers, even when they are seriously injured or killed on the job."

The 13th Amendment to the Constitution outlaws slavery and involuntary servitude "except as punishment for a crime," AP reports. "That clause is currently being challenged on the federal level, and efforts to remove similar language from state constitutions are expected to reach the ballot in about a dozen states this year."

Meanwhile, many U.S. prisons "lease" incarcerated people for labor. "An analysis of data amassed by the AP from correctional facilities nationwide traced nearly $200 million worth of sales of farmed goods and livestock to businesses over the past six years," McDowell and Mason write. That amount does not include sales to state and government entities. 

Corporations who "hire" prisoners not only harness cheap, reliable labor, but they may reap additional benefits such as tax credits and other financial incentives. "Incarcerated workers also typically aren't covered by the most basic protections, including workers' compensation and federal safety standards," AP reports. "In many cases, they cannot file official complaints about poor working conditions."

Linking prison labor to shelved products requires following a complex web, but AP found "Mammoth commodity traders that are essential to feeding the globe like Cargill, Bunge, Louis Dreyfus, Archer Daniels Midland and Consolidated Grain and Barge have in recent years scooped up millions of dollars' worth of soy, corn and wheat straight from prisons, which compete with local farmers."

To read how AP reporters crisscrossed the country to uncover agriculture trading practices tied to prison labor, read the full story here.

Quick hits: Released prisoners need better access to jobs; cloud-seeding may not help much with drought

Here's a roundup of stories with rural resonance; if you do or see similar work that should be shared on The Rural Blog, email us at heather.chapman@uky.edu.

Several drought-stricken states are experimenting with cloud seeding to bring rain. But it's not a simple process, and not as promising as they might have hoped. Read more here.

Though Congress passed a law requiring states to report the number of people who have died in custody, it was never properly implemented, so the federal government doesn't have reliable statistics on how many people die in U.S. jails and prisons each year. That matters for a lot of reasons, including accountability. Read more here.

Rural white people and Blacks face the same high barriers to finding a job after imprisonment, putting both groups at similarly high risk of recidivism, a study found. The study found strong links between unemployment, "fatherlessness" as a result of having a parent in prison, and child poverty in rural areas, much the same as in urban areas. The study found that long-term imprisonment is associated with these issues, but not short-term stints in jail. Policies that make it easier for former prisoners to find work could significantly reduce recidivism and improve child welfare. Read more here.

The Rural Health Information Hub has an updated backgrounder guide on Rural Emergency Preparedness and Response. Read more here.

Anti-vax sentiment may be rising among prison staff

Cumulative Covid-19 case rate in prisons, jails and detention centers.
UCLA Law map; click the image to enlarge it or click here for the interactive version.

"Health experts had warned that getting sufficient vaccines to prisons would be a logistical challenge. But a new slate of difficulties — from a deadlier Covid-19 variant to anti-vax misinformation — has slowed vaccination rates in prisons, particularly among corrections staff," Eva Herscowitz reports for The Crime Report, a publication of the Center on Media, Crime and Justice in the John Jay College of Criminal Justice at the City University of New York. 

For example, only 22 percent of Pennsylvania Department of Corrections guards were vaccinated as of mid-June. "An April report by the Prison Policy Initiative found a similar trend nationwide: designated a priority group, prison staff have refused the vaccine in vast numbers, leaving entire prison populations — and surrounding communities — at risk," Herscowitz reports. "According to the report, 48 percent of prison staff members nationwide had received at least one dose, although in some states rates remained in the teens."

John Eckenrode, president of the Pennsylvania State Corrections Officers Association, told Herscowitz that all demographic groups have some vaccine hesitancy, and said vaccination should be an individual choice. But others, such as a New York corrections officer, say guards are less likely to get vaccinated because they don't want to look weak, and because of misleading right-wing social media posts.

"That rationale aligns with the tactics commentators are deploying on right-wing networks, including Fox News. According to The New York Times, high-profile hosts like Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham have been spouting a stream of falsehoods — that vaccines are dangerous, people should refuse them and public authorities are inappropriately endorsing inoculation — even as the Delta variant fuels outbreaks," Herscowitz reports.

For the unvaccinated, "the more contagious and now-dominant variant is especially dangerous in prisons, where cramped conditions make social distancing and proper hygiene nearly impossible," Herscowitz reports. That's according to Josh Manson, a researcher at the University of California Los Angeles Law School's COVID Behind Bars Data Project. Covid-19 outbreaks in prisons can hurt the other prisons and surrounding communities as infected officers bring the virus home with them, and transferred prisoners bring it to other facilities.

Rural community colleges could get a financial boost from restoration of Pell grant access to prisoners

Newly restored federal funding for prison education could benefit not only prisoners, but rural colleges and the communities around them (since prisons are disproportionately in rural areas).

Higher education programs in prison have been scarce for the past 16 years "because the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 (commonly referred to as the 1994 crime bill), which was sponsored by then-Sen. Joe Biden and achieved bipartisan support, prevented incarcerated people from accessing Pell Grants, which was the primary funding source for prison education," Anya Slepyan reports for The Daily Yonder. President Obama began and President Trump expanded a program to restore Pell Grant access to select prisons, including dozens in rural areas, and in December Congress voted to restore full access by 2023 to an estimated 463,000 eligible prisoners.

Prisoners and taxpayers benefit from such programs in multiple ways: The presence of the programs reduces violence within prisons, and a college education could help create upward mobility for the former prisoners' families and break generational poverty cycles. Also, "participants are 48 percent less likely to return to prison after being released, and the Vera Institute estimates that providing postsecondary opportunities to incarcerated people could reduce state prison spending around the country by $365.8 million annually," Slepyan reports. "Other studies show that as an investment, 'prison education is almost twice as cost-effective as incarceration,' and that taxpayers save $4-5 for every $1 spent on prison education. This is partially because earning a college degree in prison open opportunities for returning citizens who are often locked out of employment and further educational opportunities through background checks and other hiring policies that discriminate against the formerly incarcerated."

Rural colleges benefit because prisoners' tuition gives them much-needed funding, which could enable them to not only stay open, but possibly expand programs or hire new instructors. That means more jobs and educational opportunities for non-incarcerated locals too, an appealing prospect for rural community colleges where enrollment has tanked during the pandemic.

Now that funding is restored, "rural colleges around the country are gearing up to provide higher education opportunities to incarcerated students," Slepyan reports. "Many of the colleges are focusing on providing degrees that will lead to practical career paths for incarcerated students."

Inmates sue to be released from jail amid pandemic

As prisons and jails become covid-19 hotbeds, incarcerated people "with medical vulnerabilities and short times left on their sentence are suing for release—and if that fails, they want masks, gloves, and the space to socially distance," Emma Coleman reports for Route Fifty. "In courtrooms across the country, lawyers are pushing to release more people from jail in order to allow them to quarantine at home and free up space for those inside to socially distance. The issue is particularly urgent for people with chronic medical conditions—about 40 percent of those held in state prisons and local jails."

Thousands of people were released from jails in the early days of the pandemic, especially those awaiting trial for minor offenses or serving time for non-violent crimes. "But so far, judges have been largely resistant to allowing categorical releases of those not eligible for those earlier reprieves who are medically vulnerable, have short times left on their sentences, or are in jail awaiting trial," Coleman reports. "Instead, some judges are ordering that jails follow CDC recommendations, such as providing soap and sanitizer and making space for people to socially distance.

Most jails have said they're doing they best they can, but family members of the incarcerated, jail reform advocates, and some jail employees say it's not enough to prevent the spread of covid-19. "People in jail say there is little air ventilation and cramped sleeping quarters. They’ve repurposed garbage bags as gloves and socks as masks. In written testimony filed with lawsuits, several described watching people die in the bunks next to them," Coleman reports.

But some communities and victims rights organizations have argued that offenders shouldn't receive clemency because of the pandemic, and some governors, like Greg Abbott in Texas, have barred the release of some detainees, saying it would threaten public safety, Coleman reports.

"Health experts counter that not releasing people is the bigger risk to public safety. Jails and prisons with high infection rates become vectors for the surrounding communities—in one prison 80% of the population inside tested positive," Coleman reports.