President-elect Trump Pledges to Seek Death Penalty for Certain Federal Criminal Defendants
President-elect Trump has pledged to seek the death penalty for certain federal criminal defendants, just days after President Biden controversially commuted the death sentences of 37 inmates. Biden’s move to reclassify the death sentences to life without the possibility of parole was heavily criticized by Republicans and many Democrats.
Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform, “As soon as I am inaugurated, I will direct the Justice Department to vigorously pursue the death penalty to protect American families and children from violent rapists, murderers, and monsters. We will be a Nation of Law and Order again!”
Only three men on federal death row failed to meet Biden’s requirements for having their sentences commuted. They are Robert Bowers, the Tree of Life Synagogue shooter; Dylann Roof, a White supremacist who killed nine Black parishioners; and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who worked with his brother to carry out the Boston Marathon bombing.
Trump spokesman Steven Chueng called Biden’s action a “slap in the face to the victims, their families, and their loved ones.” During Trump’s first term, 13 federal prisoners were put to death, the most under any president in a century. Upon taking office in 2021, Biden declared a moratorium on federal executions.
