THE BOP – AN AGENCY IN CRISIS
“THE BUCK STOPS HERE”
President Harry S. Truman
After years of struggling to staff some of the country’s toughest prisons, the Federal Bureau of Prisons is now watching its officers leave for higher-paying jobs at ICE. The Trump administration’s deportation push has fueled an ICE hiring blitz, with $50,000 bonuses and tuition perks—an offer many BOP officers say is too good to pass up.
From Florida to California, staff report waves of colleagues departing: six at one Texas prison, eight at another, more than a dozen at a California facility, and over four dozen at a larger site. By early November, BOP had lost at least 1,400 more employees than it had hired this year.
“We’re broken and we’re being poached by ICE,” one union official said. Too bad their contract was cancelled.
The ongoing losses have worsened critical shortages of food, hygiene supplies, and staff, leading to further lockdowns and reduced access to health care. Frustration and stress abounds staff and inmates alike.
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AUGUMENTATION
Teachers and medical staff are feeling the strain, often reassigned as officers in a process called Augmentation. It’s disheartening to see some facilities unable to provide basic necessities like paper towels, soap, or toilet paper for their staff. This situation is challenging for everyone involved and is nationwide.
Augmentation. Page 8
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“I’ve never seen anything like this in 25 years,” an officer in Texas said.
BOP leadership did not answer detailed questions – instead,
In a video statement, Deputy Director Josh Smith blamed “shambles” left by the previous administration and said staffing was “catastrophic,” but promised aggressive reforms and “transparency and accountability.”
11/21/2025 Video
My Comment;
In video 11/21/2025, Deputy Director Josh Smith acknowledged the pain employees have endured, including forced overtime. They will be offering one-time payments: GS8 (and below) $4000, GS9 & 11(and below); $2500, and GS12-15: $1000. But blaming others, as Deputy Smith did, is not helpful to anyone.
11/19/2025
Like blaming others (prior administrations and The Deep State), as Deputy Director Josh Smith did in his Video Message of 11/19/2025, this eventually has to stop. The Buck Stops at the Desk of BOP Leadership and the President – they knew that this would not be easy. The lack of food, water, and toilet paper (for inmates and staff alike), coupled with reduced pay and overtime, is not acceptable.
Accepting responsibility is key (without blaming others); ICE, DoorDash, Lyft, Uber, and others will continue to purge employees from the BOP. Infrastructure, layoffs, and everything that should have been done were yesterday; enough of Big-Beautiful-Bill and what others didn’t do. Let’s see what you do; only time will tell.
Currently, the BOP has 4,000 vacant positions. The result is that AUGMENTATION has left the agency with so few officers that teachers, nurses, and electricians in prisons are regularly ordered to abandon their regular duties and fill in as corrections officers.
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If crime is coming down, per The Sentencing Project, why are prisons and their populations rising? On the federal side, if the FSA SCA Task-Force is manually performing the calculations and moving eligible individuals in Halfway Houses (RRC) to home confinement, the next step is to move those eligible for early release directly to home confinement…
RRCs should have open beds, prison populations should drop, and, at least on paper, overhead begins to fall. Here is part of our Catch-22: Augmentation. Without teachers for programming, and medical staff to provide care – “The Catch-22.” No Teachers – No ETC, No Medical Staff – Delayed or No Access to Healthcare. This applies to: FMC, FCI, FCC, yes, nationwide throughout the BOP.
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The Sentencing Project reports that the United States has made little progress in ending mass incarceration, even as crime rates decline. By the end of 2024, violent crime is expected to drop to half its 1990s levels, with property crime falling even more, similar to trends seen in other countries that did not increase imprisonment.
In contrast, U.S. imprisonment rates rose for nearly two decades while crime rates fell. Although there has been some recent decarceration, this progress is now at risk.
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Back to when ProPublica contacted ICE, they declined to address specifics but noted that they have issued over 18,000 tentative job offers this year.
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ProPublica, The BOP and Its Challenges.
- From sex abuse scandals and contraband problems to crumbling infrastructure and poor medical care, it’s seen as the worst federal workplace according to their employee surveys.
- Oversight officials have blamed chronic understaffing that may have resulted in at least 30 prisoner deaths.
- Then there was the executive order that cancelled the employees’ union contract, which has not helped employee spirits or retention.
In September, Moore White informed ProPublica that prisons were falling behind on utility bills and facing food shortages, particularly at Oakdale, Louisiana, where a union intervened to prevent riots. Other facilities reported shortages, like no eggs in California and reduced beef portions in Texas.
A defense lawyer mentioned the Los Angeles detention center ran out of pens for inmates in solitary confinement, forcing some to ration ink. Hygiene supplies were also low, with reports of shortages of toilet paper and tampons.
Reduced staffing has limited access to medical care. In Victorville, complaints arose about cutbacks leading to missed procedures for inmates. Chyann Bratcher at Carswell missed a necessary surgery due to staffing issues.
Facilities have implemented “blackout” days to reduce overtime, using staff from other roles as temporary corrections officers (AUGMENTATION). Tom Kamm, who retired after 29 years(My job was to try to settle EEO complaints…), chose to leave upon learning he’d need to work two shifts per week as a corrections officer.