How many prisoners were released from US Prisons during Covid?
Executive summary
The available reporting does not produce a single, authoritative national tally of every person released from U.S. prisons during the COVID-19 pandemic, but multiple reputable sources document large-scale reductions in incarcerated populations and specific programs: the Department of Justice shifted more than 30,000 federal inmates to home confinement, and national prison populations fell sharply—roughly in the mid‑teens percentage range in 2020—driven by accelerated releases and sharply reduced admissions [1] [2] [3].
1. The headline numbers: home confinement and population declines
The clearest concrete figure in contemporary reporting is that the Justice Department moved more than 30,000 non‑violent federal prisoners to home confinement under CARES Act authorities during the pandemic period, a discrete count repeatedly cited in national coverage [1]. That federal home‑confinement action sits alongside broader population trends: The Sentencing Project reports a remarkable 14% decline in U.S. prison populations in 2020, attributing the fall principally to accelerated releases and fewer admissions during the pandemic’s first year [2], and Prison Policy’s national “Whole Pie” analysis documents an unprecedented ~15% drop in confined populations in that same period [3].
2. Why those declines aren’t the same as “released” and why totals vary
Reports that the prison population fell sharply do not map one‑to‑one onto a single count of “people released” because declines reflect several moving pieces: releases (regularly scheduled releases, compassionate/medical releases, COVID‑era credits and policy changes), dramatic reductions in court processing and new admissions, and transfers to community supervision or home confinement [2] [3] [1]. Analysts and advocacy groups explicitly warn that population drops during 2020 were produced both by proactive decarceral policies and by administrative slowdowns that simply meant fewer people entered prison [2] [3]. The result is inconsistent accounting across jurisdictions and agencies.
3. State experiments and big one‑off programs (where numbers exist)
Several states enacted explicit decarceration measures whose outputs were measurable: for example, New Jersey’s Public Health Emergency Credit Act produced “thousands” of early releases and is singled out in qualitative and quantitative studies as one of the largest rapid reductions in a state system [4]. But state actions varied widely in scale and eligibility, complicating aggregation into a single national release figure absent a consolidated federal dataset [4].
4. The limitations of public data and why precise national totals are elusive
Public data are fragmented: federal counts (e.g., DOJ home confinement) track one narrow category well [1], while state and local releases are reported unevenly and sometimes only as population changes rather than explicit release tallies [3] [2]. Research organizations and courts documented many compassionate releases and sentence‑reducing maneuvers early in the pandemic, yet no single source in the provided reporting aggregates all forms of release (regular completions, early releases, compassionate/medical releases, home confinement, parole and program credits) into one definitive national number [1] [4] [2].
5. What the evidence supports as a defensible answer
Based on the supplied reporting, a defensible, evidence‑based statement is: at least 30,000 federal prisoners were placed on home confinement, and U.S. prison populations fell roughly 14–15% in 2020—changes driven by a mix of accelerated releases and reduced admissions—implying that hundreds of thousands fewer people were confined over the pandemic year compared with pre‑pandemic counts, though a precise total of “how many released” at the national level is not published in the cited sources [1] [2] [3]. That phrasing reflects what the documentation supports and what remains unquantified in the public record provided.
6. Stakes, debates and reporting agendas
Advocates framed releases as public‑health imperatives and racial‑justice opportunities, while critics focused on public safety and uneven application of release criteria; journalists and researchers alternately highlight headline population declines or specific program counts depending on source access and institutional focus [4] [2]. The patchwork nature of reporting—federal program tallies next to state case studies—creates an implicit agenda risk: single figures (like “more than 30,000”) can be amplified as representative of all releases when they, in fact, reflect one legislative channel [1].