Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey signed into law Friday several prison infrastructure bills that will use coronavirus relief funds to build two super-size prisons. The Republican governor ignored criticism from Democrats who blasted the plan, saying the COVID-19 funds were not meant to be used for these types of projects. But Ivey, a Republican, characterized the bills as a “pivotal moment for the trajectory of our state’s criminal justice system.” The governor said that using $400 million of the $2.1 billion federal relief money the state received was a way to deal with a long-held problems in prison infrastructure.

Despite the complaints from Democrats, the truth is that the White House has given states lots of discretion on how to use the relief cash. In its guidance on using the funds, the Biden administration has said the money can be used to protect “vital public services” and also to address the increase in violent crime over the summer. “These prisons need to be built, and we have crafted a fiscally conservative plan that will cost Alabamians the least amount of money to get the solution required,” Ivey said in a statement earlier this week defending the plan from criticism.

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Some Democrats in Congress have criticized the plan, including Rep. Terri Sewell of Alabama, who said the funds from the American Rescue Plan were not intended to be used this way. But Republicans said the two 4,000-bed men’s prisons are vital to the state. Construction should begin early next year and will take around three years to complete. “This was the right thing for Alabama to do. We’ve got crumbling infrastructure. We’ve got people housed in places that are filthy. We’ve got individuals working in conditions that are unsafe,” Republican state Sen. Greg Albritton said. When asked earlier this week about Alabama’s plan, White House press secretary Jen Psaksi said, “I would be surprised if that was the intention of the funding.”

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Some Democrats in the state are hopeful that the federal government will tell the state that funds can’t be used this way. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler of New York this week sent a letter to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen asking her to “prevent the misuse of ARP funding by any state, including Alabama” to build prisons. “Directing funding meant to protect our citizens from a pandemic to fuel mass incarceration is in direct contravention of the intended purposes of the ARP legislation and will particularly harm communities of color who are already disproportionately impacted by over-incarceration and this public health crisis,” Nadler wrote.

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