Alongside the release of the report, the DOJ announced that at Trump’s request it has directed the Federal Bureau of Prisons (FBOP) to expand execution protocol to include the use of a firing squad.
Why is this wrong and unjust?
- Federal executions are carried out in the state where the crime took place, but only five states even allow execution by firing squad.
- Like every other execution method, a firing squad is cruel. On April 11, Mikal Mahdi was executed by a three-person firing squad. An autopsy revealed two wounds on his chest, not three, and not a single bullet hit his heart! He suffered tremendously as his liver and other internal organs were damaged.
- There are only three defendants on federal death row once President Joe Biden converted 37 sentences to life in prison before he left office. Only one of the three on federal death row lives in a state that allows a firing squad execution. According to National Public Radio, those currently on death row are Dylann Roof, who carried out the 2015 racist slayings of nine Black members of Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina; 2013 Boston Marathon convicted bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev; and Robert Bowers, who fatally shot 11 congregants at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue in 2018, the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S history. (April 24)
There are usually “buts” following a Trump pronouncement. This time the “buts” include him seeking the death penalty for 44 additional people. He wants to prevent anyone on federal death row from being able to seek clemency. Trump also wants the FBOP to examine relocating or expanding federal death row or constructing an additional execution facility to permit additional manners of execution.
Trump wants to streamline the process for seeking death sentences and cut down the number of years between a conviction and an execution. What Trump probably does not realize or is in denial about is that support for the death penalty, just like support for him, is decreasing every year. Why?
- Over 200 people have been exonerated off death rows in the U.S.
- It has been publicized that innocent people are in fact executed.
- Alternate punishments are much less costly.
- Prosecutors lie or hide exculpatory evidence.
- Police chiefs rank the death penalty last in their priorities for effective crime reduction. The truth about U.S. executions is that no method is safe from torture and no method is quick. Also the U.S. death penalty mainly targets people of color and workers in disproportionate numbers.
From guillotines to hangings, to electrocutions, to lethal injections, to gas chambers, to nitrogen gas, to firing squads — There is no humane way for a state or the federal government to legally murder a person.
If you want information on botched executions, go to deathpenaltyinfo.org/executions/botched-executions
The real solution? Abolish ALL legal lynchings aka executions in the U.S.
Texas says death row — We say hell no!
(Emphasis original.)
Most of the points against death sentences in this article are pointless because this isn’t about actually executing real criminals and the truly dangerous. It’s about opening the doors to killing anyone they want.
They argue based on a system that is a lie. They cannot comprehend that this whole thing is about just leading the way to kill leftists, protestors, minorities, etc. It is to turn prisons into concentration camps.
You are right they can kill anyone they want. Although usually I believe death sentences are their solution to deal with overcrowded prisons.
autopsy revealed two wounds on his chest, not three.
Firing squads always include one or two rifles loaded with rubber bullets, as that gives the executioners plausible deniability to believe that they weren’t the one who fired a killing shot.
The Trump administration is committing Federal crimes. Come on Irony, you could do the funniest thing with this.
