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FCC closes "final loopholes" that keep prison phone prices exorbitantly high


FCC wasn't able to cap intrastate prices until Congress granted new authority.

The FCC said it "voted to end exorbitant phone and video call rates that have burdened incarcerated people and their families for decades. But the FCC said it now has authority over intrastate prison phone prices because of the Martha Wright-Reed Just and Reasonable Communications Act, which was approved by Congress and signed by President Biden in January 2023. The 2023 law—named for a grandmother who campaigned for lower prison phone rates—"removes the principal statutory limitations that had prevented the Commission from setting comprehensive just and reasonable rates," the FCC said.

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