logo
logo
Sign in

President Joe Biden to End the Federal Death Penalty Permanently

avatar
Jennie Miller

US President Joe Biden has become the first sitting US President openly opposing the death penalty. The White House officials informed a news outlet that Biden has discussed the possibility of instructing the Department of Justice to stop scheduling new executions. The supposed move would end an extraordinary run of executions by the federal government all during a pandemic. It raged inside prison walls and infected journalists, federal employees, and even those put to death. The White House press secretary Jen Psaki was asked on Friday about Biden’s plans on the death penalty. She replied that she had nothing to preview on the issue. Point to be noted that the action to stop scheduling new executions could take the immediate pressure off Biden from opponents of the death penalty.

President could also face some challenges about the supposed measures. Many Americans who paid close attention to the resumption of federal executions under the former President Donald Trump were dismayed by their scale and the apparent haste to carry them out. However, the coronavirus pandemic and election coverage dominated the news last year. The executions were started on 14th July and ended 4 days before Biden’s inauguration on 20th January. These were the first federal executions in the last 17-years. The executions went ahead for inmates whose lawyers claimed were too mentally ill or intellectually disabled to fully grasp why they were being put to death. A woman Lisa Montgomery was convicted of killing a pregnant Missouri woman and cutting out her baby. On 13th January, she became the first woman executed federally in nearly 70 years.

President Biden can guarantee no federal executions during his presidency by simply telling the Justice Department never to schedule any. But it would not prevent a future president who supports capital punishment from restarting them. Barack Obama did place an informal moratorium on carrying federal executions out when he was president. He ordered a review of execution methods in 2014 after a botched state execution in Oklahoma. But Obama never took any steps toward ending federal executions for good. It left the door open for Trump to resume them. Death penalty critics want Biden to slam shut that door. The perfect way to prevent a future president from again restarting executions is to sign a bill abolishing the federal death penalty. In a 22nd January letter, 37-members of Congress urged Biden to support the Federal Death Penalty Prohibition Act.

Source: http://www.vindulacms.com/president-joe-biden-to-end-the-federal-death-penalty-permanently/

collect
0
avatar
Jennie Miller
guide
Zupyak is the world’s largest content marketing community, with over 400 000 members and 3 million articles. Explore and get your content discovered.
Read more