Attorney General Jeff Sessions Rescinds Obama-Era Private Prison Phase-Out, Citing 'Future Needs of Federal Corrections System'

Attorney General Jeff Sessions issues a one-paragraph memorandum rescinding the August 18, 2016 directive from Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates to phase out federal use of private prisons. Sessions claims the Obama policy “changed long-standing policy and practice, and impaired the Bureau’s ability to meet the future needs of the federal correctional system,” citing concerns about “overcrowding” despite declining federal prison populations.

The reversal comes just one month into the Trump administration and immediately after private prison stocks had already doubled since Trump’s election. CoreCivic stock rises 3.7% and GEO Group gains 1.5% in late trading after the announcement. Sessions provides no evidence that private prisons are necessary or cost-effective, contradicting the Justice Department’s own Office of Inspector General findings that private facilities are more dangerous and no less costly than government-run facilities.

The memo demonstrates the Trump administration’s commitment to expanding mass incarceration and immigration detention to benefit private prison corporations that donated heavily to Trump’s campaign and inauguration. Both GEO Group and CoreCivic subsidiaries donated $250,000 each to Trump’s 2016 inaugural committee. Sessions’ reversal guarantees that federal contracts will continue flowing to private prison companies, allowing them to profit from Trump’s immigration crackdowns and criminal justice policies. The speed and brevity of the reversal—just five weeks after Trump’s inauguration—reveals it as a political reward to corporate donors rather than a considered policy decision.