Ahead of Donald Trump’s ascension to the White House, incumbent US President Joe Biden commuted the death sentences of 37 out of 40 people to life in prison without parole, US media reported on Monday.
With less than a month to go before taking office, Biden faced growing calls from death penalty opponents to commute the sentences of death row inmates to life without parole, which 37 people will now serve.
The move makes only a few known murderers who acted out of hatred or terrorism, which was the subject of a moratorium under Biden, eligible for the death penalty. Biden said in a statement:
“These commutations are consistent with the moratorium my Administration has imposed on federal executions, in cases other than terrorism and hate-motivated mass murder. I am commuting the sentences of 37 of the 40 individuals on federal death row to life sentences without the possibility of parole.”Â
The inmates who will remain on federal death row are Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who helped carry out the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing and Dylann Roof, a convinced white supremacist who shot and killed nine black churchgoers in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015. Robert Bowers, who killed 11 Jewish churchgoers in the 2018 mass shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, will also remain on death row.
Among those who have had their sentences commuted are nine men convicted of killing fellow inmates, four for murders committed during a bank robbery and one who killed a prison guard.
On December 12, Biden decided to pardon 39 people. He also commuted the sentences of nearly 1,500 people, the largest single-day pardon in US history. The decision, which affects non-violent offences, drew criticism from President-elect Donald Trump, who called it an abuse of power.
Before the election, Donald Trump said he did not rule out the possibility of pardoning current US leader Joe Biden’s son Hunter if he won. Later, the media wrote that after returning to the White House, the Republican may pardon the participants in the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021, New York Mayor Eric Adams, accused of corruption and fraud, as well as Hunter Biden.
During the US presidential race in 2024, Republican candidate Donald Trump said he intended to work to expand the range of offences that would be punishable by the death penalty.
