Georgia AG Chris Carr Ready to Shoot at Drones to Stop Prison Cellphone Smuggling
Prison contraband crackdown effort expands beyond jamming as drones draw scrutiny.
WASHINGTON, April 10, 2026 – Georgia’s Republican Attorney General Chris Carr said he wants to shoot down drones delivering contraband into state prisons.
In a campaign video posted Thursday on YouTube, Carr, who is running for Georgia governor in the May 19 primary, said he is not waiting for the White House to endorse or approve his aggressive plans to “shoot ’em down.” He was joined by Grady County Sheriff Earl Prince, who has endorsed Carr for governor and supported Carr’s message about stopping the drones.
On March 27, Carr led an effort urging Sebastian Gorka, deputy assistant to the president and senior director for counterterrorism, to give states the authority to “use multiple means necessary” to stop prison contraband arriving by drone. Carr was joined by 20 other Red State attorneys general who wrote the letter, explaining how drones are being used to smuggle weapons, cellphones, drugs, and more into state prisons.
While Carr did not specify what he meant by using “multiple means necessary” to stop drones, his campaign video makes it clear that he means shooting them.
In the letter, the attorneys general said state departments have reported “a sharp increase in drone drops over prison grounds,” with Georgia reporting approximately 58 drone incidents per month. Without the legal authority and the necessary tools to intervene with the drones in real time, the attorneys general said this is a public safety threat that undermines security and allows people to coordinate crime behind bars.
While drone-enabled contraband has been a more recent problem, the contraband itself, especially with cellphones, is not new.
On Sept. 30, 2025, the Federal Communications Commission adopted a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) to allow state and local prisons to use FCC-approved, targeted jamming technology against contraband cellphones. Jamming would mean sending radio signals on the same frequencies as cellphones so the phones cannot connect to nearby cell towers, effectively blocking calls. FCC Chairman Brendan Carr said this would be voluntary and not a federal mandate to jam.
While the NPRM was popular among 23 Republican state attorneys general who voiced support for jamming contraband cellphones, several mobile carriers and trade associations disagreed. The wireless association CTIA warned that jamming could disrupt 911 calls, emergency alerts, medical monitoring devices, and crash notification systems. The signals could also spill over outside of prison walls and disrupt communications for surrounding communities, CTIA argued.
In addition to CTIA, AT&T, Verizon, Telecommunications Industry Association, Competitive Carriers Association, Wi-Fi Alliance, and Satellite Industry Association also opposed the change with similar concerns.
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