REPLAY: Arkansas AG Griffin Holds Press Conference With FCC Chief Brendan Carr

Y'all can just come on around here if you want to. Thank y'all for being here. I appreciate it. This looks like a technology show or an old cell phone collection or something. This is really a follow-up to a lot of other actions that folks up here have taken over the years. This is the issue of cell phones in prison and what to do about them. On the legislative side, Senator Cotton has been pushing for years to address this issue. And about a little over a year ago, we had a press conference here. Before that, I had a press conference with the senator at his invitation in D.C. Attorneys general have written numerous letters on this issue. There have been various efforts by prison officials and law enforcement over the years. This has been a huge issue. The issue of prisoners holding communications technology in prison and using it, using this technology, these cell phones, to commit more and more crimes, not just crimes, but violent crimes. crimes that led to the shooting of prison officials in in some states we've got south carolina's folks uh up here and um we've had escapes here that involve jet skis and relatives and cars and making their way to west virginia orchestrated by cell phones we have had all sorts of even abuse of of uh of minors with CSAM materials involving cell phones so this is an ongoing problem that we've had and the question has been how do we fix it you know the legislative process can take a while and and kudos to the senator senator cotton for continuing to push this push it push it i remember we were talking about it in 24 uh when i was first here and it wasn't going anywhere so we're like okay well i guess you'll have to bring it up in the next session which he did and um so about a year ago we were here with the governor and chairman chairman car Senator Cotton and we were recognizing the issue and talking about what needed to happen and you don't always get the solution after government officials identify the problem, but the good news is today we think we are on the verge of some great success thanks to all the pressure and all the work of Senator Cotton and uh and Chairman Carr and and all the others so i'm gonna let uh the chairman here in a minute talk a little bit more about the details but the good news is that uh under Chairman Carr's leadership the FCC he is he has got a vote scheduled coming up soon in a couple of weeks to allow for jamming of cell phones in our prisons. There's been an obstacle to this for years because of the way that the regulations have been written. And now we're on the verge of a solution that will allow our prisons and prisons all around the country to address this threat. And that's going to make not only the individuals in the prison safer, it's going to make us all safer. Because make no mistake about it, they're not just using the cell phones to operate criminal enterprises in the prison. They're operating them from prison on the outside, right? Violence on the outside. Drug deals on the outside. Human trafficking on the outside. CSAM materials on the outside. in your neighborhoods, in my neighborhoods, everywhere around the country, they are running these enterprises from prison. And so this is really good news that Senator Cotton and Chairman Carr are bringing today. And I'm just happy to be up here. Really, if you talk to the folks who are on the front lines, the prison officials and others, they'll tell you, this is really outstanding news outstanding news and maybe they'll mention the the just the thousands thousands of cell phones that they have recovered in prison we actually forget when it was but we were down uh and toured one of the prisons and saw some of the some of the stuff and you can just see examples these are these are cell phones uh that have been recovered and they've arranged for often those cell phones are used to arrange for drones to drop materials so just this is just a great day because we are circling back we identified a problem we talked about the possible solution now we're circling back to say hey we're on the verge of something big one thing i want to mention innovation has been thwarted in this area in the jamming area because of this freeze because of this prohibition i believe that what you're going to see when the fcc makes this change you're going to see people who want contracts the market will engage in a more robust way and we will have more innovation in this area than we've ever seen because now there will be a market incentive to address this problem and we're going to get better and better at it and the price of it will be reduced as a result of this competition so all of this will flow from this action so just a great day and i appreciate all y'all being here and i want to turn it over to senator cotton well good morning uh thank you all for joining us uh thanks tim our great attorney general and thanks to Brendan Carr, the Federal Communications Commission Chairman for your work to help eradicate the threat of contraband cell phones in prisons for several years criminals have smuggled tens of thousands of contraband cell phones into state and local and federal prisons to continue criminal activity from behind bars. Incarcerated criminals who should no longer pose a threat to public safety have been known to use contraband cell phones to distribute drugs, to order hits inside and outside of prisons, and to facilitate other violent crimes. For example, a major prison drug ring in Georgia moved more than 14 kilograms of meth and nearly a kilogram of heroin into the Atlanta area using contraband cell phones from behind bars also in South Carolina prisoners used contraband cell phones to run a sextortion scheme targeted hundreds of our troops and tragically led to the suicide of several victims and an inmate behind bars in New Jersey ordered an assault on his ex-girlfriend and the murder of her new boyfriend on a contraband cell phone. Not only do these illicit cell phones cause alarming dangers outside of prison walls, but they also endanger brave correctional officers and members of our law enforcement community doing their jobs. During a visit to the Varner Supermax unit in Lincoln County last year, sheriffs and correctional officers told us that getting rid of contraband cell phones is one of the most dangerous parts of their jobs. We've heard their concerns loud and clear. Today's announcement is going to make their jobs easier and safer. Thanks to Chairman Carr's leadership at the FCC, we're in the homestretch of making contraband cell phones in prisons about as useful as a paperweight. Allowing state and local prisons to use targeted jamming equipment will remove a dangerous threat to the general public and to Americans working in law enforcement and corrections facilities. The operative word here, of course, is targeted. this technology is very advanced it won't interrupt with lawful communications outside of prisons or jails keep in mind this jamming equipment is also an optional tool for our prisons and jails it's not a mandate but based on the many conversations i've had with law enforcement and correctional officers around our state i'm confident that most of them will be able to put it to very good use while an important step in stopping prisoners from continuing their crimes from behind bars. There are many ways to get the job done. That's why I'll continue working with my colleagues in Congress to codify these changes into law with my cell phone jamming bill. Make no mistake, behind bars, contraband cell phones are not a communications device only. They are a dangerous weapon. I'm pleased to support these efforts to get contraband cell phones out of our prisons and in doing so to reduce crime in our communities. Thank you all. Well, it's great to be back here in Little Rock. Just about one year ago, we all stood here, Senator Cotton, Attorney General Griffin, and made a promise to the American people that we would deliver real results and change on what is a significant matter of public safety. and now we're here to explain exactly what we're going to do in three weeks from now the FCC is going to vote on a decision that will authorize state and local jails to jam contraband cell phones for the first time ever we always announce our votes three weeks ahead of time in the item itself the draft decision will be released to the public in the coming days as well at this point we've all seen the statistics and heard the stories, but the reality is, is over a half a million, roughly 500,000 inmates right now have had access to contraband cell phones. One study showed that 25,000 contraband cell phones are pulled out of prisons and jails every single year. We see some of the examples of that here. They're being used by some of the worst criminals to continue to carry out egregious conduct they're ordering hits orchestrating kidnappings running drug operations and unfortunately increasingly they're using it as part of child sexual exploitation we've seen now examples where prisoners are using cell phones to pressure and coerce people into engaging in all sorts of lurid illegal acts with young children and have videos of that sent inside of prisons i think the general public has not been aware of the scope and scale of the contraband problem for me i first started focusing on this several years ago i was in south carolina we have some of the officials from south carolina here today and i met captain johnson his job was to find and remove contraband cell phones from prisons people said it's the most dangerous job you can have inside of a jail because prisoners will do everything they can to keep and continue to use these contraband cell phones. He was told that if he kept continuing to do his job that they would order a hit on him. He kept doing his job and they ordered a hit on him. He was getting dressed one morning. His front door was kicked in. He was shot six times. He survived. He's gone on to become a tremendous advocate for making change when it comes to contraband cell phones. I was in touch with Captain Johnson just this morning. He said he's going in soon for another surgery. It's a decade plus later. He's in 24-7 pain, but he is hopeful and he's optimistic that we can do something to avoid other people going through what he has gone through. This isn't going to be a silver bullet at the end of the day, but it's a tool that has been denied law enforcement and corrections officials for too long. There are targeted applications of jamming technology where you can focus on living quarters and other areas, and the demonstrations to date show that it will be a hundred percent effective in those contexts over the years we have given corrections officials more and more tools try to manage this issue there's been some progress made but not enough it's now we're removing an obstacle that the federal government had in place to state and local officials deploying this technology we're going to work closely with them to authorize jamming of state and local prisons we expect that this is going to make significant progress on this issue and again i think it is a great example of the government delivering real practical results for the american people this would not have happened but for the leadership of senator cotton at the federal level continuing to push and advocate on this for the work of state officials like general griffin here and the corrections officials across many different state lines have made this possible so again in three weeks from now we're going to vote at the federal level It's going to remove a restriction that prohibited jamming. Corrections officials can apply to the FCC, outline how they're going to do their jamming. They'll get approval from the agency, and they'll be able to get going. So we're excited to get this deployed because, again, this is going to make a significant difference both inside prisons for keeping our corrections officers safe, but in communities all across the country given the significant amount of criminal activity that's taking place right now through the use of contraband cell phones. Great to be back here with you to make this announcement. I'll turn it back over to the Attorney General. Thank you, Chairman. Thank you, Senator. I just want to quickly introduce, I want to welcome our friend Joel Anderson from South Carolina Department of Corrections. He works over there with my good friend, Alan Wilson, who is a rock star AG. We appreciate you being here and your input on this because of y'all's experience, which has been horrific, actually, has been a key part in developing the argument of why this has to be done. Welcome Lindsay Wallace from our Department of Corrections, Scott Bradley from the Sheriff's Association, Dexter Payne also from the Department of Corrections, and Brandy White. She represents prison officials nationally. Is that good? Federal prisons. That's a federal prison. So these are folks who all understand on a daily basis firsthand why this is a problem. I've had folks ask me before, is it really a problem? Well, people are dying, and your neighborhood is less safe because of this problem. It's beyond question. The problem was easy to identify, and now we have a solution. Thank goodness. I'll take a couple questions before I head to Hope for an opioid uh meeting yes ma'am good uh Mr. Carr, are you anticipating any challenges to this I seem to remember last year when during the press conference where you initially announced this you said that the mechanism was going to be something along the lines of deauthorizing legal cell phone use within prisons has that been done before do you expect any challenges it's possible we could see some appeals of the FCC decision but we are very confident in our legal authority here, so I'd be surprised if there's a significant, meaningful challenge to this. The specifics to your point is there's a provision of federal law that has said that jamming interference is prohibited when you do it to authorized communications. And so we're going to go back to that law and clarify that authorized communications are no communications inside the boundaries of a prison. Once you deauthorize cell phones inside specific boundaries of prisons, then this law no longer prohibits you from engaging in jamming technology. We think it's actually a common-sense solution. It's supported by the record that's been developed at the FCC, and we feel confident in our legal case. And just to be clear, correct me if I'm wrong, there aren't authorized prison cell phones right now. There's no place where they're authorized to walk around the yard chit-chatting on their cell phone. So when you deauthorize, you're not taking away the ability of a prisoner to speak to mom. That's not an option now. The deauthorization is technically any cell phone. It's an oversight. There's nobody who can't call mom because of this action. They're not allowed to use these. They're certainly not allowed to have snacks dropped via drone. this is a there are other ways that people communicate which are i believe monitored in most cases that's a different thing anybody else yes ma'am hi Laura Turbay with the Associated Press um i have a question for senator um what are your thoughts on the midterm election environment right now well obviously it's nip and tuck all around the country but we've got great candidates running we have great candidates here in arkansas we got great candidates all around the country i'm very confident that in the end we're going to be able to win the senate i think we have a great chance to hold the house as well because the american people remember what it was like under joe biden we've had nine percent inflation higher taxes our border was wide open communities were less safe for the last two years we've been able to take important public safety initiatives like this one here today to protect our communities from contraband cell phones cut taxes to create more jobs to secure our border and build a stronger military And the American people look at what is on offer from the Democrats, which is taking us back to the Biden era. We're building on the success over the last two years. I think we're going to have a successful year. Any other questions on this matter? And you can ask the political stuff out on the street. Yes, ma'am. Does this decision to, and this might be another question for Mr. Barr, does this, would this rule change open the door to potentially deauthorizing cell phone use in other places outside of prisons? Thanks for the question. That's not something that's been under consideration by the FCC at all. Again, I think what we have here is a very unique confluence of events, plus 10-plus years of work and effort here. We have had many years of attempts to use alternate technologies to try to make enough progress that we can really declare this meaningfully have changed. So I'm not aware of any other context at this point where you would have years of efforts, many, many alternative technology approaches that haven't worked. So I think at this point, our view is that the jamming authorization is unique as to prisons and jails. Thank you all. Appreciate you.