Gavin Newsom promised to empty California’s private prisons. Can he do it?

A movement to abolish prisons run by private companies has grown over the past decade from a fringe position to a rallying cry for liberal presidential candidates — and now, California Gov. Gavin Newsom.

Activists argue that corporations motivated by profit have a perverse incentive to support policies leading to more prison time for more people and to skimp on the services they provide to inmates.

Newsom joined those critics last year when he declared on hiscampaign website that for-profit prisons “contribute to over-incarceration.” In his January inaugural address, he promised to “end the outrage that is private prisons in the state of California once and for all.”

Unlike his pledges to build more housing or establish a single-payer health care system, Newsom has the direct authority to make this campaign goal a reality — by moving about 3,700 inmates out of four private prisons in California and one in Arizona.

But to fulfill his promise, Newsom will have to confront the challenges of slimming down California’s overburdened prison system to make more space, at a time when state prisons are barely under a federal court-imposed cap for their inmate population. Read more >>>