Biden believes in shrinking the US prison population

Joe Biden believes that there are many people in prisons and jail today that do not belong there. Furthermore, he believes that no one should be incarcerated for a nonviolent crime, such as nonviolent drug crimes. In fact, he wants anyone arrested for a drug problem to go straight to a rehabilitation center, not a prison cell.^[1]However, he has stated that there are people that should stay behind bars as they committed horrible crimes, and are a threat to society.^[2] This position may come from the fact that there has been a steep rise in incarceration in recent decades. Right now, The United States has more prisoners than any other country in the world, as well as the highest incarceration rate.^[3] There are about 2.3 million people in prisons and jails in the U.S. right now. This is more than a 500% increase over the last 40 years.^[4]This is due in large part to the types of crime people are being convicted of. Today, there are more people behind bars for drug-related offenses, than the number of people incarcerated for any crime in 1980.^[4]