Outgoing US President, Joe Biden has commuted the sentences of 37 out of 40 federal death row inmates, changing their punishment to life imprisonment without parole.

It is the highest number of death sentences commuted by any President in the modern era.

The decision follows mounting pressure from campaigners who warned that the President-elect, Donald Trump, backs the death penalty and restarted federal executions during his first term after a 17-year hiatus.

Biden said in a statement, “Make no mistake: I condemn these murderers, grieve for the victims of their despicable acts, and ache for all the families who have suffered unimaginable and irreparable loss.”

“But guided by my conscience and my experience as a public defender, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Vice President, and now President, I am more convinced than ever that we must stop the use of the death penalty at the federal level.

“In good conscience, I cannot stand back and let a new administration resume executions that I halted.”
Joe Biden

The clemency action applies to all federal death row inmates except three convicted of terrorism or hate-motivated mass murder.

These three are Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, convicted of carrying out the 2013 Boston marathon bombing attack; Dylann Roof, who shot dead nine Black church members in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015; and Robert Bowers, who stormed a synagogue in the heart of Pittsburgh’s Jewish community and killed 11 worshippers in 2018.

Interestingly, Biden’s journey on the issue has been complicated. As a Senator, he championed a 1994 crime bill that expanded the federal death penalty to cover 60 new offences.

The legislation is now widely seen as having contributed to mass incarceration, particularly affecting Black men, and many of those currently on death row were sentenced under its provisions.

However, during his 2020 presidential election campaign, Biden reversed his long-held support for capital punishment, pledging to eliminate it at the federal level. He cited concerns about wrongful convictions and racial disparities in the justice system.

The Biden administration duly imposed a moratorium on federal executions. Calls for the president to commute the federal death sentences mounted in recent weeks.

He received letters from corrections officials, business leaders, Black pastors, Catholics, civil and human rights advocates, prosecutors, former judges, victim family members and others.

Pope Francis publicly offered a prayer for those on federal death row, urging Biden to extend mercy to them.

The White House said Biden’s latest action would prevent the next administration from carrying out the execution sentences that would not be handed down under current policy and practice.

Under Trump, more people incarcerated in the federal system were put to death than under the previous 10 Presidents combined.

The Republican’s administration ended a pause of 17 years when it executed Daniel Lewis Lee, and followed that with six more executions between July 16 and September 24, 2020.

According to the White House, Biden has issued more commutations at this point in his presidency than any of his recent predecessors at the same point in their first terms.

Earlier this month, he announced clemency for about 1,500 Americans; the most ever in a single day, who have shown successful rehabilitation and a commitment to making communities safer.

Biden’s Decision Welcomed

Bryan Stevenson, Founder and Executive Director of the non-profit Equal Justice Initiative, said, “Today marks an important turning point in ending America’s tragic and error-prone use of the death penalty.”

He added that by commuting almost all federal death sentences, President Biden has sent a strong message to Americans that the death penalty is not the answer to our country’s concerns about public safety.

Martin Luther King III, the son of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr, also hailed Biden’s move.

“This is a historic day. By commuting these sentences, President Biden has done what no president before him was willing to do: take meaningful and lasting action not just to acknowledge the death penalty’s racist roots but also to remedy its persistent unfairness.”
Martin Luther King III

Additionally, two Democrats who sponsored bicameral legislation to ban the use of the death penalty at the federal level welcomed the announcement.

The Senate Majority Whip, Dick Durbin, Chair of the Senate judiciary committee, stated, “I have long advocated for the abolition of the federal death penalty and commend President Biden for this act of justice and mercy and for his leadership.”

Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts praised Biden’s move as a “historic and groundbreaking act of compassion that will save lives, address the deep racial disparities in our criminal legal system, and send a powerful message about redemption, decency, and humanity.”