Sponsors (18)
The bill clarifies criminal liability and forces timely updates to BOP policies to improve safety and legal clarity, but it increases enforcement and incarceration exposure, raises potential costs for taxpayers, and risks stricter or hastily implemented rules that could harm some incarcerated people.
Law enforcement, federal prosecutors, and courts get clearer statutory text and an explicit penalty for violations involving the listed object, improving charging consistency and reducing legal ambiguity.
Bureau of Prisons must review and modernize policies within one year to reduce incidents involving prohibited objects, improving workplace safety for corrections staff and creating clearer procedures that can better protect incarcerated people (including people with disabilities).
The one-year deadline creates a timely accountability mechanism to ensure policy review and modernization rather than leaving updates open-ended.
People convicted under the new clause can face up to two years' imprisonment when the specified object is involved, increasing criminal exposure for defendants.
Clarifying and expanding penalty exposure may lead to more prosecutions and incarcerations, raising incarceration and enforcement costs borne by taxpayers.
If policy updates are implemented as more restrictive rules without strong safeguards, some incarcerated people—particularly those with disabilities—could face increased disciplinary actions or reduced privileges.
Based on analysis of 3 sections of legislative text.
Adds a specific up-to-2-year maximum prison term for certain contraband offenses and requires the BOP to review and, if necessary, update contraband policies within one year.
Official title: Increase the penalty for prohibited provision of a phone in a correctional facility, and for other purposes.
Introduced February 26, 2025 by Charles Ernest Grassley · Last progress June 15, 2026
Amends the federal criminal statute on introducing prohibited objects into correctional facilities to add a specific two-year maximum prison term for certain items and renumber existing penalty paragraphs. It also directs the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) Director to review and, if needed, update BOP policies within one year to better protect incarcerated people and staff when inmates make, possess, obtain, or try to obtain defined “prohibited objects.” The Act is mostly technical (renumbering plus a new explicit penalty) and requires an administrative policy review and updates by the BOP.