Garland Must Commit to Finishing Obama s Work on Solitary | Opinion Tammie Gregg
, director, ACLU s Stop Solitary Campaign On 2/26/21 at 6:00 AM EST
Merrick Garland s nomination to serve as U.S. attorney general comes at a critical time in our history. Over the past year, millions of Americans have taken to the streets to demand an end to the brutality and systemic racism that has plagued all of our nation s institutions including the criminal legal system since its inception.
Heeding these righteous calls for justice could solidify Garland as one of the most significant attorneys general to ever hold the office, but it requires righting many wrongs that his predecessors were either unable or unwilling to address. As former principal deputy chief of the Justice Department s Special Litigation Section in the Civil Rights Division, I recognize the awesome power that Garland will soon hold. Rising to the moment demands bold action.
In December, Covid-19 infections in prisons in the United States hit a record 25,000 in one week. Among correctional staff that month, there were an additional 5,000 new infections a week, leading to spread in surrounding communities. According to a New York Times database, collectively, more than 580,000 people at correctional institutions have been infected. The prisoner death toll has now surpassed 2,000.
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Eleven months into the pandemic, the U.S. prison system has not gotten control of its rising caseload, which is likely still underestimated, according to The Marshall Project, a nonprofit journalism outlet focused on criminal justice issues. Doctors, attorneys, prison reform advocates, and public health researchers are increasingly concerned about one of the tactics that prisons are using to isolate symptomatic individuals: solitary confinement, the prolonged use of which is an intern