Biden considers commuting the sentences of death row inmates

As President Biden’s mandate is coming to an end, he is reportedly considering commuting the sentences of most, if not all, of the 40 men the federal government is awaiting on death row.

The Wall Street Journal, citing sources familiar with the matter, reported that the move would thwart President-elect Trump’s plan to streamline executions when he takes office in January.

Attorney General Merrick Garland, who oversees federal prisons, recommended that Biden commute all but a handful of outrageous sentences, the sources said.

The media reported that possible exceptions could include Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the 2013 Boston Marathon bomber who killed three and injured more than 250; Robert Bowers, who killed 11 people in the attack on the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018; and Dylann Roof, who killed nine in 2015 at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina.

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President Biden speaks about his administration’s economic game and the future of the U.S. economy at the Brookings Institution in Washington on December 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

Those whose death sentences have been commuted to life in prison include a former Marine who killed two young girls and later a naval officer, a Las Vegas man convicted of kidnapping and killing a 12-year-old girl, a Chicago podiatrist who fatally shot a patient to prevent her from testifying in investigation into Medicare fraud, and two men were convicted in a kidnapping-for-ransom scheme that resulted in the murders of five Russian and Georgian immigrants.

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The move came after Biden, a lifelong Catholic, spoke with Pope Francis Thursday. In his weekly prayer, Pope Francis asked for the exchange of American condemned prisoners.

The president could make a decision by Christmas, some sources said. The media noted that the biggest issue is the extent of replacement of death row inmates.

President Biden speaks at the lectern (AP)

Biden is the first president to openly oppose the death penalty, and his 2020 campaign website said he would “work to pass legislation to abolish the death penalty at the federal level and encourage states to follow the federal government’s lead.”

In January 2021, Biden initially considered an executive order, sources familiar with the matter told The Associated Press, but the White House did not issue one.

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Six months in the administration, Attorney General Merrick Garland announced a moratorium on the federal death penalty to further study it. The narrow measure meant there were no federal executions under Biden.