Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., called for sentencing reform Thursday, saying the prison system hasn’t rehabilitated anyone in West Virginia.
“We haven’t rehabilitated a soul … and we’ve put people away that shouldn’t be put away,” Manchin said of incarceration in West Virginia at the Atlantic’s Summit on the Economy. “Basically, as a politician, if you don’t vote for the tougher sentencing guidelines, you’re weak on crime and then your opponent will beat the living crap out of you. That’s how messed up it is.”
Manchin said too many people are imprisoned for their first offense and taken out of working society.
“We’ve got to have sentencing guideline changes. It’s got to change,” Manchin said. He went on to call it a bipartisan issue and mentioned he’s been working with Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., and Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., to find a solution.
The United States has one of the highest incarceration rates in the world, according to the International Centre for Prison Studies. The U.S. rate is second only to the tiny island nation of Seychelles. For every 100,000 population, 698 U.S. residents are in prison. By way of comparison, the incarceration rate in Russia is 468 prisoners per 100,000 people.
In total, the U.S. has 2.2 million prisoners, half a million more than the prison population of China.
