Bureau Of Prisons Backtracking On First Step Act Law

It has been five years since President Donald Trump signed the sweeping criminal justice regulation called the First Step Act (FSA). FSA allowed many federal inmates to earn credits to reduce their sentence or to transition to home confinement for a part of their sentence by participating in meaningful programming and activities.

FSA has been plagued by missteps by the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP). First the agency was caught off guard in January 2022 when the final rule on FSA was published in the Federal Register. It was only then that the BOP realized Congress’ intent of reducing the prison populations by pushing many low and minimum inmates to have get out of prison sooner and/or to put them in the community for a greater part of their sentence.