President Trump convened a news conference last week to celebrate the release of 3,000 federal prisoners on July 19 as part of the First Step Act. But not all of those inmates will actually walk free: 750 non-citizens could well face deportation.
It is one more example of the inflated hopes and modest reality of the First Step Act, which eases sentences for drug convictions, improves prison conditions and creates more job-skills training programs—but only in the federal system, which accounts for less than 10 percent of those incarcerated.