President Obama's Executive Order to Delay Criminal Background Checks for Inmates Seeking Jobs

President Barack Obama will sign an executive order on Monday, Nov. 2, to help ex-felons leaving prison find work once on the outside. The new order will delay criminal background checks "until later in the application process," according to The Huffington Post. Thus making it easier for inmates seeking rehabilitation after serving time in prison.

As of this reporting, the Unites States has roughly more than 12 million ex-cons who are seeking employment outside of prison. President Obama's executive order will (hopefully) help rectify that issue, giving the ex-felon a chance to meet with an employer face-to-face rather than immediately being pushed aside due to the earlier questions regarding past crimes on an application.

Mic reports that studies show there is a considerable number of those within the hiring process who are biased against applicants who have committed crimes, specifically former convicts.

This is not the first time the President has spoken out about the American criminal justice system. Back in September, he appeared alongside VICE's Shane Smith in a sit-down discussion about the prison system in the Unites States. Furthermore, the two met with a number of inmates at the El Reno Federal Prison to discuss the hardships of being locked inside, and the more difficult issue of being on the outside.

During that discussion, President Obama brought up the idea of pushing back criminal background checks during the application process.

It should be noted that President Obama's initiative is merely for the non-violent offender, as mentioned in the above video.

Watch VICE's special report on the American criminal justice system over on HBO.

 Last July, Barack Obama became the first sitting president to visit a federal prison. He invited VICE along to film the historic event for part of our new HBO documentary, Fixing the System, which investigates America's broken criminal justice system. We just put the full documentary online at VICE.com, where you can watch it for free until October 12.

A photo posted by @vice on Sep 28, 2015 at 2:34pm PDT