Thanks to free calling policies, incarcerated people made nearly 600 million more calls, totaling 6.4 billion mins, than they otherwise would. Call usage jumped 80% in prisons and doubled in jails. This is Finding 1: Increased Connection of our new report. Visit connectfamiliesnow.com/poweroffree.

This is the culmination of 8 years of work, and I couldn’t feel more grateful for what we’ve been able to do at Worth Rise. I remember our first Connecting Families campaign in NYC, and our belief that this was right. Today, the data couldn’t be clearer: free communication changes everything.

Learn more about the prison system tonight with author and criminal justice advocate Bianca Tylek (@biancatylek.bsky.social @worthrises.bsky.social) as she discusses her book, "The Prison Industry: How It Works and Who Profits" (published @thenewpress.bsky.social) at The Maison Projects.

GOOD NEWS! Private prison GEO Group tried to avoid trial for unjustly withholding wages from immigrant detainees by appealing to SCOTUS, claiming it should be afforded government immunity as a contractor. The Court just UNANIMOUSLY ruled against GEO Group. www.politico.com/news/2026/02...

Durham & Asheville friends - @biancatylek.bsky.social of Worth Rises is coming to NC this week to discuss her new book, The Prison Industry: How it Works and Who Profits. Join her and special guests on Wednesday in Durham and Thursday in Asheville. Both events are free to attend!

'The Prison Industry' from @biancatylek.bsky.social @worthrises.bsky.social @thenewpress.bsky.social is recommended in our Year in Books by our EIC Andrew Crespo: "In this book, Tylek and Worth Rises offer the movement to end mass incarceration a critically helpful tool."

"Correctional administrators outsource food service to corporations to reduce facility operating costs, with detrimental consequences." @biancatylek.bsky.social @worthrises.bsky.social

TAKE ACTION! Elevatus Architecture and Okland Construction have been contracted by Idaho to design a new firing squad execution chamber. Help us demand they withdraw from this contract to stop this before it’s built. THREAD

I don't have words. Idaho is building a chamber for firing squad executions and this is how the architects and contractors are discussing the project. They're accounting for blood drainage and blown out eardrums, but not asking, "why are we doing this?" Who are the monsters now?

CANCEL YOUR SUBSCRIPTION TO @broadbandbreakfast.bsky.social NOW. We just learned that this niche media outlet covering technology, trusted by many, is actually sponsored by Securus, which is currently on a propaganda campaign. They're being paid to platform them and their perspective. Damn shame.

If you come to my house on Halloween, kids will get candy and adults will get a candy with a free zine illustrated by @meganpiont.bsky.social

In the U.S., we use prisoners as a source of income for the powerful, because our prison system originated with our chattel slavery system. This rate increase approval is the intentional result of that system, fought for by sheriffs and wardens and state legislators and huge corporations.

Today was a hard day. Regulations that we passed unanimously last year, after 7 years of advocacy, were largely gutted. The FCC capitulated to the correctional telecom industry in roughly doubling rate caps for prison and jail calls. I'm truly sorry. www.nytimes.com/2025/10/28/u...

"Families will have to pay $215 million more to stay connected than anticipated last year, and there’s expected to be two-thirds fewer call minutes between families and their incarcerated loved ones due to the higher rates." @biancatylek.bsky.social @worthrises.bsky.social

Tomorrow, the FCC is set to rollback a large portion of the regulations it passed unanimously with bipartisan support last year. Families will pay $215M more annually than anticipated. Worth Rises ED @biancatylek.bsky.social explains it all in @inquest.bsky.social inquest.org/your-call-co...

To prevent thousands more avoidable deaths, Centurion, Wexford, and Corizon’s deadly, profit-driven “healthcare” practices cannot continue as usual. theharvardpoliticalreview.com/health-care-...

This breakdown of the $170B increase in immigration spending to jail and cage people now rivals military budgets of entire countries. “We’re in a dark place,” says @biancatylek.bsky.social. tinyurl.com/45azkrj5

“Private prison needs more bodies to grow. Corporations have no place in any system that claims to be about justice,” @biancatylek.bsky.social on mass detention being treated as business. bit.ly/4g4qrQN

In GEO Group v. Menocal, a private contractor for ICE is claiming derivative sovereign immunity for allegedly forcing detainees to perform unpaid labor under the threat of punishment, including solitary confinement. #legal www.scotusblog.com/2025/08/the-...

People are fighting back and we love to see it! Sure, they lost and this west TN town went forward with ICE and private prison contracts, but this energy is critical right now. FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT. We will win. tennesseelookout.com/2025/08/13/w...

The CEO of ICE's data contractor Palantir thinks that people who disagree with him should "suffer". Explains a lot.

“90% detained by ICE are held in privately run facilities, making the private prison industry deeply embedded in the federal immigration detention system” shared @biancatylek.bsky.social as new corporate vendors profit from Trump-backed $45B immigration expansion. bit.ly/4mAYUbO

Incarcerated people deserve real food–not the inedible, unhealthy meals dished out by million-dollar private corporations cutting corners while people suffer serious health problems. tinyurl.com/4mz5f6z6

Some GOOD NEWS for a change! This one is personal — it’s been a long time in the making. Thank you to all those who helped along the way.

"The Prison Industry maps the range of ways in which private corporations, often with their government partners, make money off incarceration. It further details the gross extraction of wealth from incarcerated people ... brutalized by over-policing, mass incarceration, and mass surveillance."

“The ICE custody transportation industry is run by ‘a handful of large conglomerates notorious for varied types of abuses across the world,’” @biancatylek.bsky.social People disappear, suffer harm, and even die while in ICE custody. worthrises.org/jointhefight capitalbnews.org/black-immigr...

The state of correctional healthcare is in crisis with 3 major private providers filing for bankruptcy due to lawsuits in the past 2 yrs. It’s time we shift back to a public option. Here’s one jail doing it after its provider filled only 20% of positions. provincetownindependent.org/featured/202...

Tune into @wetwired.bsky.social’s podcast featuring @biancatylek.bsky.social as she discusses The Prison Industry book and how the carceral system profits from exploitation without delivering justice: bit.ly/4kt9d09

Here’s an excerpt from my book The Prison Industry: How It Works and Who Profits. Get your copy for you and a friend today. Worthrises.org/theprisonindustry

The executives at the nation’s largest private prison operator, GEO Group, are wasting no time in upping compensation and cashing in on the immigration detention and deportation boom. www.investing.com/news/sec-fil...

This defies all logic, and I explain why below. But it does continue the wealth grab that defines the Trump Administration. A thread.

Politicians are being targeted for ensuring proper regulations on reopening detention centers like CoreCivic where people are suffering from abuse and neglect. kansasreflector.com/2025/06/16/d...

See if you can spot the difference between New York Times propaganda and the Israeli press. I know it’s subtle, let me know if you can’t figure it out.

Abelardo is the 1st person in ICE custody to die in transit in 10 years. Families are demanding answers from the private prison, transportation contractor, and healthcare provider. Sadly, there will be more. I explain why in my new book: The Prison Industry. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

This Juneteenth, remember that slavery is still legal in the US. Just look on prison farms, often former plantations, where incarcerated people are still toiling in dangerous conditions for no pay. worthrises.org/blogpost/202...

It is the EPA’s responsibility to protect against human rights violations, including hazardous chemicals being used as punishment. We cannot let GEO Group’s abuse in detention centers slide. bit.ly/4ndTLaP

Tonight, I'll go home and sleep in my bed. I have a lawyer, I'll get due process. But Edgardo, whose arm was ripped from mine by ICE agents, has none of those things. That's why I'll keep coming back to court, week after week, to make sure that people's rights are protected.

ALERT! No one is talking about the uprisings happening at private prisons across the country while Trump is expanding their use. Just this week there was one at a CoreCivic prison in TN and GEO Group detention center in NJ, both over appalling conditions. This is about to get a lot worse.

While protests rage across the country, some counties are cashing in on the violent ICE raids. Adams County, MS just negotiated higher fees from a private prison operator for access to its intergovernmental agreement with ICE for the detention of immigrants. www.natchezdemocrat.com/2025/06/03/c...

We talked with @biancatylek.bsky.social, founder and director of ‪@worthrises.bsky.social‬ about financial exploitation and slavery in prisons and her recent book, The Prison Industry – How It Works and Who Profits. Listen wherever pod.link/1593022493/e...

It’s been 2 months since The Prison Industry came out, and I’ve been on the road nearly the whole time getting out the word. Have you gotten your copy yet? Post a photo! worthrises.org/theprisonindustry

Are the brands you buy profiting from prisons? Through painstaking research that tracks and exposes the profiteers of the criminal justice establishment, the abolitionist organization @worthrises.bsky.social seeks to end the exploitation of incarcerated people and their families.

GEO Group, one of the largest private prison corporations in the country, is aiding in the Trump administration’s mass deportation agenda by providing surveillance technology to ICE. www.nytimes.com/2025/04/14/t...

BREAKING! For years, we worked to drive prison telecom Securus (aka Aventiv) into bankruptcy. Well, this week, its owner, Platinum Equity, did it out of court, simply bowing out, waving the white flag, and handing it over to lenders after defaulting on $1.6Bn in debt. Stay tuned for what this means.

Deaths at CoreCivic facilities could easily be prevented, but as long as there are no consequences they will continue. Until we eliminate the prison industry, laws like this one are necessary to stop the senseless deaths by hitting them where it hurts, their profits. fox17.com/news/local/i...

"If you and your stakeholders make money by keeping people in prison, why would you invest any resources into keeping them out of prison?" Higher recidivism is better for business for private prisons. Unsurprisingly, they're not interested in helping people reenter. filtermag.org/corecivic-pr...

"Of the approximately 2 million people currently incarcerated in the United States, around 90,00 are in private prisons ... Though data on private prisons is always muddied at best, the limited research that does exist shows recidivism rates to be higher than than those for public prisons."

Towns look to immigration detention for revenue. Beyond the ethics, the truth is that towns that have relied on carceral systems for economic growth have seen it trail those who found other means. Another carceral capitalist lie many have bought into. www.bloomberg.com/features/202...

REQUIRED READING out now from @fwd.us "People with an immediate family member in prison spend nearly $4,200 annually to support them—more than one-quarter (27%) of income for someone living at the federal poverty line." www.wecantaffordit.us

Bianca Tylek’s new book, “The Prison Industry,” reveals the companies that benefit from incarceration. Tamar Sarai spoke with Tylek of @worthrises.bsky.social on how readers can take action once understanding “how deeply entrenched & normalized corporate greed & exploitation have become.”