Trump DOJ Defunds National Prison Rape Resource Center

The Department of Justice has terminated all funding for the National Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) Resource Center, according to a letter from the National PREA Resource Center obtained by The Appeal. Among other activities, the group had previously trained prison sexual assault auditors, tracked the results of PREA investigations, and provided resources to imprisoned sexual abuse survivors. The cuts take effect immediately.

When asked for comment, a DOJ spokesperson told The Appeal in an email that “discretionary funds that are no longer aligned with the administration’s priorities are subject to review and reallocation.” The administration’s priorities are “prosecuting criminals, getting illegal drugs off of the streets, and protecting American institutions from toxic DEI and sanctuary city policies.” 

Experts and advocates working to end prison sexual assault were uniformly aghast at the news.

“The actions by the Department of Justice to immediately zero out all funding of PREA investigations and audits will tragically make it even more challenging to hold prison and jail officials responsible for the sexual assaults of the people who they have locked up,” Corene Kendrick, deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Prison Project, told The Appeal in an email.

Congress unanimously passed the Prison Rape Elimination Act, known as PREA, in 2003. The legislation sought to “provide for the analysis of the incidence and effects of prison rape in federal, state, and local institutions and to provide information, resources, recommendations and funding to protect individuals from prison rape.” It also created a commission to create standards for eliminating sexual violence in carceral settings. 

According to the center’s website, the U.S. Bureau of Justice Assistance created the PREA Resource Center in 2010 to “provide federally funded training and technical assistance to states and localities, and to serve as a single-stop resource for research and tools for all those in the field working to come into compliance with the federal standards.”

The website says the organization helps implement PREA Standards and supports the DOJ’s audits of jails, prisons, and detention centers, including immigration facilities. The center assists with audits for both adult and juvenile facilities, regardless of whether they are operated by state or local governments, corporations, nonprofits, or the DOJ. The standards require all correctional facilities to be audited at least once every three years. 

In a press release, Just Detention International, a nonprofit focused on ending sexual assault in prisons, said the cuts were “devastating” and would undoubtedly make carceral facilities more dangerous. Among other items, the nonprofit noted that the Resource Center helped teach imprisoned people about their rights and how to report sexual assault. The center also partnered with local rape centers to help support imprisoned survivors.

“The shuttering of the National PREA Resource Center is, quite simply, catastrophic for incarcerated people,” Linda McFarlane, Just Detention’s executive director, said in the release. “Its programs were a gamechanger for corrections agencies, while also helping to shed light on the conditions inside prisons and jails across the country. Without the PREA Resource Center, corrections agencies will be left on their own when it comes to best practices to stop sexual abuse—and the public will be left in the dark about what goes on inside detention facilities. But the worst outcome is that this closure means incarcerated children and adults will be decidedly less safe.”

Terry Schuster, the head of New Jersey’s prison oversight agency, told The Appeal that defunding the PREA Resource Center is a “reckless move.”

“The National PREA Resource Center is a library of every everything that’s ever been written about how to prevent and address sexual violence in custodial settings, and it’s staffed with experts who can answer one off questions from people who are running jails and prisons and juvenile facilities and police departments,” he said. “Defunding them is like burning that library to the ground.”