[caption id="attachment_141247" align="aligncenter" width="3723"] Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, (AP Photo/Cliff Owen) 

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Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-Ohio) is on board with criminal justice reform.

Boehner said Thursday that he supported the Safe, Accountable, Fair, and Effective (SAFE) Justice Act introduced by Reps. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) and Bobby Scott (D-VA).

This bill would reform mandatory minimum sentences so that only actual leaders in drug trafficking, as opposed to low-level offenders, would serve harsh sentences. It would also incentivize prisoners to participate in rehabilitation programs and try to cut down on the number of regulatory crimes.

Boehner noted that there were many people in prison "that really don't need to be there."

"I've long believed that there needed to be reform of our criminal justice system," Boehner said. "Some of these people are in there under what I'll call flimsy reasons."

The SAFE Justice Act bill is currently sitting in the House Judiciary Committee, The Huffington Post reported.

“Chairman Sensenbrenner and I have been working for months to put together a bill that includes bipartisan, evidence-based, state-tested solutions to reduce crime and save money," Scott said in a statement to HuffPo.

"I am encouraged by Speaker Boehner’s endorsement of the SAFE Justice Act and hope that his support will help us continue to build bipartisan momentum to make these changes law.”

Criminal justice reform has gotten its moment in the spotlight this week.

Boehner's comments came on the same day that President Obama became the first sitting president to visit a federal prison.

It also became a hot topic in the 2016 race with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie calling for sentencing reform in a campaign policy speech.