Trump’s death penalty push faces resistance in some red states
Caroline MolloyEven as President Donald Trump and other national Republican leaders push to expand the use of capital punishment, some GOP-led states are moving in the opposite direction.
In an executive order he signed his first day in office, Trump directed the U.S. attorney general to seek the death penalty “for all crimes of a severity demanding its use.” In two specific circumstances — when a law enforcement officer is murdered or when the defendant accused of a capital crime is an immigrant in the country without legal status — the government will pursue the death penalty “regardless of other factors.”
The Biden administration in 2021 had imposed a moratorium on federal executions.
Additionally, Trump’s order directs the U.S. Department of Justice to help states obtain lethal injection drugs, though it remains unclear how it will do so. The order also instructs the attorney general to encourage state attorneys general and district attorneys to pursue capital charges for all eligible crimes.
Trump’s order applies only to federal crimes. Each state has its own death penalty laws for state crimes.
But growing anti-death penalty sentiment in the states may limit the impact of Trump’s directive. From proposed moratoriums to repeal efforts, state lawmakers are debating the future of capital punishment amid concerns over wrongful convictions, racial disparities and high costs. Crime experts question the death penalty’s effectiveness as a deterrent, while some religious lawmakers say it is inconsistent with their opposition to abortion.
“The death penalty in this country is dying for reasons that an executive order cannot fix,” Corinna Lain, a law professor at the University of Richmond, told Stateline.
“[Trump’s] executive order will be a mirror revealing where the American people stand on the death penalty. … People that want to go there anyway will be emboldened, and in other places, it will inspire resistance,” said Lain, who also is the author of the upcoming book “Secrets of the Killing State: The Untold Story of Lethal Injection.”
In conservative Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky and Ohio, Republican lawmakers have introduced bills to abolish the death penalty. In Georgia, the House earlier this month approved a bill that would prevent the execution of people who have intellectual disabilities. The measure, which lowers the burden of proof for intellectual disability claims and introduces a pretrial hearing on whether a defendant is intellectually disabled, now moves to the Senate for consideration.
And a GOP-sponsored bill in Oklahoma would pause all pending executions and prevent new execution dates from being scheduled.
However, another bill in Oklahoma would make people living illegally in the U.S. who are convicted of first-degree murder eligible for the death penalty. And some states, including Iowa and New Mexico, are considering bills that would expand capital punishment by making the murder of a police officer eligible for the death penalty. Both states have abolished capital punishment, but there have been multiple attempts over the years to reinstate it for specific crimes.
