EL RENO, Okla. — They opened the door to Cell 123, and President Obama
stared inside. In the space of 9 feet by 10 feet, he saw three bunks, a
toilet with no seat, a night table with books, a small sink, prison
clothes on a hook, some metal cabinets and the life he might have had.
In
becoming the first occupant of his high office to visit a federal
correctional facility, Mr. Obama could not help reflecting on what might
have been. After all, as a young man, he smoked marijuana and tried
cocaine. But he did not end up with a prison term lasting decades like
some of the men who have occupied Cell 123.
As
it turns out, Mr. Obama noted, there is a fine line between president
and prisoner. “There but for the grace of God,” he said somberly after
his tour. “And that, I think, is something that we all have to think
about.”
In
visiting the El Reno prison, Mr. Obama went where no president ever had
before, both literally and perhaps even figuratively, hoping to build
support for a bipartisan overhaul of America’s criminal justice system.
While his predecessors worked to toughen life for criminals, Mr. Obama
wants to make their conditions better.
What
was once politically unthinkable has become a bipartisan venture. Mr.
Obama is making common cause with Republicans and Democrats who have
come to the conclusion that the United States has given excessive
sentences to many nonviolent offenders at an enormous moral and
financial cost. This week, Mr. Obama commuted the sentences of 46 such
prisoners and gave a speech calling for legislation revamping sentencing
rules by the end of the year.
He
came to the Federal Correctional Institution El Reno, about 30 miles
west of Oklahoma City, for a firsthand look at what he is focused on.
Accompanied by aides, correctional officials and a phalanx of Secret
Service agents, Mr. Obama passed through multiple layers of metal gates
and fences topped by concertina wire gleaming in the Oklahoma sun to
enter the facility and talk with some of the nonviolent drug offenders
who he argues should not be serving such long sentences.
El
Reno, a medium-security prison with a minimum-security satellite camp
that together house 1,300 men, was locked down for the visit. The campus
of two-story brick buildings separated by neatly trimmed grass remained
eerily silent and empty, with no one in sight other than a few security
officers peering through binoculars from a rooftop. Rather than
bursting at the seams, it had the antiseptic feel of an abandoned
military base, except for the cattle being raised on the property.
The
president was brought to Cell Block B, which had been emptied for the
occasion, its usual occupants moved to other buildings. The only inmates
Mr. Obama saw during his visit were six nonviolent drug offenders who
were selected to have a 45-minute conversation with him at a round
table. It was recorded for a Vice documentary on criminal justice to be
shown on HBO in the fall.
The
six seemed to make an impression. “When they describe their youth and
their childhood, these are young people who made mistakes that aren’t
that different than the mistakes I made and the mistakes that a lot of
you guys made,” Mr. Obama said afterward. “The difference is they did
not have the kinds of support structures, the second chances, the
resources that would allow them to survive those mistakes.”
He
added that “we have a tendency sometimes to almost take for granted or
think it’s normal” that so many young people have been locked up. “It’s
not normal,” he said. “It’s not what happens in other countries. What is
normal is teenagers doing stupid things. What is normal is young people
making mistakes.”
Mr.
Obama had the benefit of a largely comfortable upbringing and attended a
premier Honolulu prep school before going on to Ivy League
universities. If those now in prison for drug crimes had those
advantages, he said, they “could be thriving the way we are.”
Still,
he made a distinction between them and criminals guilty of crimes like
murder, rape and assault. “There are people who need to be in prison,
and I don’t have tolerance for violent criminals,” Mr. Obama said. “Many
of them may have made mistakes, but we need to keep our communities
safe.”
1.5 Million Missing Black Men
Across the country, hundreds of thousands of black men are missing from everyday life.
Opened
in 1934, the El Reno prison has held its share of murderers, rapists,
thieves and Mafia figures. At one point, it was home to Timothy J.
McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber, who was later executed. But today,
its population is made up largely of drug offenders, and its most famous
resident is probably Kwame Kilpatrick, the former Detroit mayor, who
was convicted of corruption.
Over
the years, the prison has had its own dairy and metal factory. Mr.
Obama called it an “outstanding institution” with job training, drug
counseling and other programs, but noted that it had suffered from
overcrowding. As many as three inmates have been kept in each of the
tiny cells he saw.
“Three
whole-grown men in a 9-by-10 cell,” Mr. Obama said with a tone of
astonishment. Lately, the situation has improved enough to get it down
to two per cell. But, he said, “overcrowding like that is something that
has to be addressed.”
Hands
in his pockets, he was escorted into the residential drug abuse
prevention unit by Charles E. Samuels Jr., the director of the Bureau of
Prisons, and Ronald Warlick, a corrections officer. On the walls were
phone numbers for Crime Stoppers and sexual assault hotlines, as well as
signs with words like “Change,” “Commitment,” “Honesty” and
“Accountability.”
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