Biden moves to end justice contracts with private prisons

source: New York Times
published: 26 January 2021

President Biden signed executive orders on Tuesday to end Justice Department contracts with private prisons and increase the government’s enforcement of a law meant to combat discrimination in the housing market, part of the new administration’s continued focus on racial equity.

Mr. Biden also signed orders that make it the federal government’s policy to “condemn and denounce” discrimination against Asian-Americans and Pacific Islanders, who have faced harassment since the coronavirus pandemic spread from China to the US, and to strengthen relationships between the government and Native American tribes.

7 February 20215 March 2022 4WardEverUK

Biden plans to roll back Trump’s refugee, asylum crackdowns

source: Bloomberg
published: 2 February 2021

President Biden will sign a trio of executive orders on Tuesday to reverse Donald Trump’s crackdown on asylum seekers and refugees, continuing his push to loosen his predecessor’s strict immigration policies.

Biden will direct the Department of Homeland Security to conduct a broad review of asylum programs that were targeted by the Trump administration, asking his administration to rescind proclamations, rules, and guidance documents intended to curb the entry of migrants seeking humanitarian protection in the U.S.

9 November 2020 4WardEverUK

‘Ingenuity’ programme to highlight creative arts of prison inmates

prison soap carving — Prison inmates soap carving

source: National Justice Museum
published: 9 November 2020

Michelle Hubbard, the Senior Creative Engagement Practitioner from the Nottingham based National Justice Museum, has asked us to circulate details of the project she is developing called ‘Ingenuity’, based around exploring an historic collection of beautiful objects crafted by people in prison.

Some of these objects will have been made in prison workshops, some will have been made illicitly with crude materials and items to hand. for example there are several beautifully made little soap carvings that the maker would have whittled away at (probably late at night) to fill the hours of emptiness and loneliness, using just their government issue soap ration, and maybe a finger nail or matchstick to carve it with.