Opponents of the death penalty had been urging Biden, who had less than a month left in office, to commute the sentences of the 37 inmates on death row to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Ahead of Donald Trump's return, who oversaw a sweeping number of lethal injections during his first term, US President Joe Biden commuted the death sentences of 37 out of 40 federal prisoners on Monday.Opponents of the death penalty had been urging Biden, who had less than a month left in office, to commute the sentences of the 37 inmates on death row to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Only a small number of well-known murderers who committed acts of terrorism or hatred are now subject to the federal death sentence, which has been suspended under Biden.
"These commutations are consistent with the moratorium my Administration has imposed on federal executions, in cases other than terrorism and hate-motivated mass murder," Biden stated in a press release.
"I am commuting the sentences of 37 of the 40 individuals on federal death row to life sentences without the possibility of parole," he stated.
Dylann Roof, an ardent white supremacist who shot and killed nine Black churchgoers in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015, and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who assisted in carrying out the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, are among the three prisoners who will continue to be housed on federal death row.
Robert Bowers will also stay on death row for the 2018 mass shooting at Pittsburgh's Tree of Life synagogue, which claimed the lives of 11 Jewish attendees.
Nine inmates convicted of killing other inmates, four for killings during bank robberies, and one for killing a prison officer were among those commuted.
"Make no mistake: I condemn these murderers, grieve for the victims of their despicable acts, and ache for all the families who have suffered unimaginable and irreparable loss," Biden stated.
"But guided by my conscience and my experience...I am more convinced than ever that we must stop the use of the death penalty at the federal level," he stated.
Trump's increase of the death penalty
Biden opposed the death sentence throughout his presidential campaign, and after he was elected, the Justice Department placed a federal moratorium on its application.
Trump repeatedly advocated during his reelection campaign to extend the death penalty to include drug and people traffickers as well as migrants who murder U.S. citizens.
Before Trump restarted federal executions in July 2020, no federal inmates had been executed in the US since 2003.
During his last six months in office, he oversaw 13 executions by lethal injection—more than any other US leader in 120 years.
The final federal execution occurred on January 16, 2021, four days prior to Trump's departure from office, and was carried out by lethal injection at a prison in Terre Haute, Indiana.
Of the 50 states in the US, 23 have abolished the death penalty, while six more—Arizona, California, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and Tennessee—have moratoriums in effect.
There have been 25 executions in the US in 2024, all of which took place at the state level.
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