The First United States President Ever To Visit a Federal Correctional Institution Obama

The First United States President Ever To Visit a Federal Correctional Institution Obama

BHR HollyWood Reports.........President Obama visits the El Reno Federal Correctional Institution outside of Oklahoma City, marking the first visit by a sitting President to a federal prison.
 July 16, 2015.

El Reno Federal Correctional Institution 

President Obama stepped into the doorway and, in the late morning light, took in the nine-by-ten foot prison cell, the cot and the bunk bed, the flip-flops and hanging khaki uniforms, the toilet and sink tucked in the corner and small metal night stand with some magazines, books and a dictionary.

Obama stood there for a minute as corrections officer Ronald Warlick and Bureau of Prisons director Charles Samuels pointed and explained -- noting that three men lived in this crammed space.

President Obama with six inmates in prison for drug offenses

In a presidential first, Obama visited a federal penitentiary today, a medium-security prison in El Reno, Oklahoma. The trip caps a week-long effort by the White House to highlight the need for criminal justice reform.

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While there, he met with six inmates in prison for drug offenses.

"Every single one of them emphasized the fact that they had done something wrong, they are prepared to take responsibility for it, but they also urged us to think about how society could've reached them earlier on in life to keep them out of trouble," the president said.

"We have to consider whether this is the smartest way for us to both control crime and rehabilitate individuals," the president said Thursday. "We have to reconsider whether 20 year, 30 year, life sentences for nonviolent crimes is the best way for us to solve these problems.