The Congressional Record is a unique source of public documentation. It started in 1873, documenting nearly all the major and minor policies being discussed and debated.
“National Correctional Officers and Employees Week (Executive Session)” mentioning Tom Cotton was published in the Senate section on page S2468 on May 12.
Of the 100 senators in 117th Congress, 24 percent were women, and 76 percent were men, according to the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
Senators' salaries are historically higher than the median US income.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
National Correctional Officers and Employees Week
Mr. COTTON. Mr. President, our Nation just concluded National Correctional Officers and Employees Week. Because the Senate was not in session last week, I want to take this opportunity to recognize these heroes and everything they do to protect our people and uphold the rule of law.
Every day, correctional officers go in to work to guard and operate our Federal prisons, State prisons, and local jails. They not only administer justice on behalf of innocent victims, but they also defend the guilty from unjust adversity.
They combat the drug trade so that addicts can recover. They fight back against vicious prison gangs so that inmates can have a chance to find redemption instead of recidivism. They confront the most violent offenders so that persons with short minimum-security prison sentences don't turn out to have what is a death sentence.
Without safety, security, and structure, our prisons and our jails would devolve into anarchy, into chaos, and crime. Correctional officers combat these forces of disorder so that these facilities can instead be centers of self-improvement and, indeed, correction. As a result, many inmates are able to pursue education, learn marketable skills, and find solace in God.
The profession of a correctional officer is both noble and very dangerous. Fewer than 450,000 correctional officers protect and police approximately 1.5 million inmates in a normal year, around the clock, every minute of every day.
Riots, jailbreak attempts, and targeted anti-police violence are common and result in particularly high-risk situations for correctional officers. In a 9-year period measured by the National Institutes of Health, correctional officers suffered over 125,000 work-related injuries and 113 tragically lost their lives.
Correctional officers willingly endure this danger, suffer these injuries, and sometimes give their lives so that our families, neighborhoods, and communities can be safe. The least we can do is to recognize their sacrifice and express our gratitude.
This year, our correctional officers did even more than usual. For the past 14 months, they have worked tirelessly to keep our inmates healthy in the middle of this global pandemic. They shifted normal confinement arrangements, and they maintained order among the population under enhanced stress due to coronavirus protocols.
Correctional officers have done an amazing job and saved so many lives during this crisis. Sadly, some even paid the ultimate price for their work. They should be proud of their work, and we ought to be proud of them. So from the floor of the U.S. Senate, I certainly can say I am proud of our correctional officers.
But our Nation should go beyond gratitude. We ought to give correctional officers the funding, the wages, the equipment, the facilities, and the support that they need.
To start, Congress can finally crack down on contraband cell phones. Inmates use them to maintain their criminal enterprises from behind bars and to terrorize those who put them there. They also use them to victimize other inmates and to prey upon random victims outside prison walls. In other words, prisoners use these cell phones to undermine the life's work of correctional officers.
Contraband cell phones are even used as tools of retribution against the officers themselves. In 2010, a gang member imprisoned in South Carolina used a contraband cell phone to order the murder of Captain Robert Johnson. Captain Johnson was then mercilessly shot six times in the chest and stomach in his own house. Remarkably, he survived the attack, and he is now a leading advocate for taking action against contraband cell phones.
Regrettably, the use of contraband cell phones shows no sign of slowing. On the contrary, they are becoming ubiquitous weapons inside of our prisons. While available technologies can be helpful, it is also increasingly clear they are not capable of solving the problem alone. So that is why I will soon be reintroducing my Cell Phone Jamming Reform Act. This bill would empower State prisons to install jamming technology and turn contraband cell phones into nothing but useless paper weights. This easy and commonsense step will honor the hard work of correctional officers to clean up our streets and to keep our Nation safe.
The men and women of this country--law-abiding citizens and those who serve their time alike--owe a debt to our Nation's correctional officers. So I, once again, want to thank them for their courageous and diligent service. And I hope they took time last week to celebrate National Correctional Officers and Employees Week because they certainly deserved it.
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