Over the past three weeks, thousands of incarcerated people in Alabama have gone on strike in state prisons, stopping their work in prison facilities–work they aren’t paid for. The action comes after years of reported widespread negligence in the state’s prisons.

According to the Equal Justice Initiative, 14 people have been killed in prisons so far this year – putting the state on course to break a record set in 2019, when 18 homicides were recorded. As the strike carries on, inmates say that they’re receiving fewer meals and less recreation time as a form of punishment. State officials deny that claim, saying that normal services can’t be provided since the inmates aren’t working, and Alabama governor Kay Ivey said the corrections department has the current situation “well under control.”

We talk with Keri Blakinger, a reporter with The Marshall Project, to get the latest on the situation.