Has a 2018 criminal-justice reform law reduced the number of minorities in prison?
Since the First Step Act was passed in December 2018, at least 2,376 people have received retroactive sentencing reductions, the vast majority of whom were minorities. In July 2019, more than 3,100 inmates were released for good conduct under the act. The law sought to retroactively reduce excessive federal sentences and ameliorate federal prison standards.
According to the U.S. Sentencing Commission, 91.4% of those receiving shorter sentences were Black prisoners and 3.7% were Hispanic.
In 2019, the incarceration rate for Black people was the lowest in 24 years, with 452,800 Black inmates in federal and state prisons, according to Bureau of Justice Statistics data. The rate has been falling steadily since 2009. Almost 2.3 million people of all races are still serving time across the U.S. justice system.
