New Poll Finds Bipartisan Opposition to Use of the Death Penalty as It is Actually Administered

A new nation­al poll has found that bipar­ti­san majori­ties of Americans oppose seek­ing the death penal­ty against vul­ner­a­ble groups of defen­dants who his­tor­i­cal­ly have been dis­pro­por­tion­ate­ly sub­ject­ed to its use. 

The poll, con­duct­ed by the Justice Research Group (JRG) November 3 to 5, 2021 and released February 17, 2022, found that Democrats, Republicans, and Independents by mar­gins of more than 30 per­cent­age points opposed the use of the death penal­ty against peo­ple with severe men­tal ill­ness (click to enlarge graph­ic), brain dam­age, or intel­lec­tu­al impair­ments, and against vet­er­ans with post­trau­mat­ic stress dis­or­der. The poll found plu­ral­i­ties of each group opposed to seek­ing the death penal­ty against vic­tims of severe abuse, and Americans near­ly even­ly split on the pro­pri­ety of the death penal­ty for ado­les­cent offend­ers between the ages of 18 and 21.

“When peo­ple think of death row and those who pop­u­late it, they may envi­sion the most dan­ger­ous and incor­ri­gi­ble, … not the most vul­ner­a­ble, men­tal­ly ill, and impaired,” the JRG wrote in a mem­o­ran­dum accom­pa­ny­ing the release of the poll. However, the memo says, those who are actu­al­ly sen­tenced to death and exe­cut­ed tend not to be ​“the ​‘worst of the worst’ … [but] the most impaired and vul­ner­a­ble.” The poll­sters said they ​“want­ed to test how pub­lic sup­port for the death penal­ty changes when peo­ple are asked what they think about how the death penal­ty works in reality.”

Presenting the poll results at a February 23, 2022 American Constitution Society/​Fair and Just Prosecution webi­nar on pros­e­cu­tors and the death penal­ty, Death Penalty Information Center Executive Director Robert Dunham not­ed that Americans ​“don’t actu­al­ly know” who is being sen­tenced to death. The poll results, he said, are ​“real­ly impor­tant because the American pub­lic, it turns out, does not sup­port the death penal­ty that is actu­al­ly admin­is­tered in the United States.”

The Poll Results

The Justice Research Group con­duct­ed a nation­al sur­vey of 1,135 like­ly vot­ers, using a sam­ple rep­re­sen­ta­tive of like­ly vot­ers by age, gen­der, edu­ca­tion, race, and vot­ing his­to­ry. It had a mar­gin of error of ±3 percentage points. 

The poll found that 60% of like­ly vot­ers ​“oppose [their] local pros­e­cu­tor seek­ing a death sen­tence against a per­son with a diag­nosed men­tal ill­ness,” com­pared with 27% who sup­port such pros­e­cu­tions. Independents opposed cap­i­tal­ly pros­e­cut­ing those with men­tal ill­ness by a 42 per­cent­age-point mar­gin, 63% to 21%. The mar­gin was 36 per­cent­age points among Democrats (62% to 26%) and 24 per­cent­age points among Republicans (55% to 31%).

Opposition to seek­ing the death penal­ty against those ​“with seri­ous intel­lec­tu­al impair­ment, for exam­ple some­one who has an IQ score of 75 points,” was uni­form­ly high. 59% of like­ly vot­ers, includ­ing 61% of Democrats, 59% of Independents, and 58% of Republicans opposed the death penal­ty for the intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled or near-intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled. The mar­gin was by 33 per­cent­age points nation­wide and among Democrats and Independents, and by 32 per­cent­age points among Republicans.

Likely vot­ers were even more strong­ly opposed to seek­ing death sen­tences against indi­vid­u­als with a trau­mat­ic brain injury. 63% of like­ly vot­ers, includ­ing 66% of Independents, 64% of Democrats, and 59% of Republicans opposed seek­ing the death penal­ty in these cir­cum­stances. 23% of like­ly vot­ers, includ­ing 19% of Independents, 24% of Republicans, and 25% of Democrats sup­port­ed such capital prosecutions.

Opposition to ​“seek­ing a death sen­tence against a per­son who suf­fers from post-trau­mat­ic stress dis­or­der after serv­ing their coun­try in the U.S. armed forces” was near­ly as high. 61% of like­ly vot­ers, includ­ing 67% of Independents, 63% of Democrats, and 56% of Republicans oppose the death penal­ty for vet­er­ans with PTSD. 25% of like­ly vot­ers, includ­ing 19% of Independents, 25% of Democrats, and 28% of Republicans would sup­port their local pros­e­cu­tor seek­ing the death penal­ty in such circumstances.

Americans opposed ​“seek­ing a death sen­tence against a per­son who has endured severe phys­i­cal or sex­u­al abuse as a child,” though less strong­ly. Likely vot­ers opposed the prac­tice by a 49% to 37% plu­ral­i­ty. A major­i­ty of Democrats (53% to 34%) and plu­ral­i­ties of Independents (48% to 34%) and Republicans (45% to 42%) also opposed seek­ing the death penal­ty in these circumstances.

The most pro­nounced par­ti­san dif­fer­ences involved whether local pros­e­cu­tors should seek the death penal­ty in cas­es of defen­dants who were ​“over the age of 18 but under the age of 21” at the time of the offense. Democrats opposed seek­ing the death penal­ty against these ado­les­cent offend­ers by a 19-per­cent­age-point mar­gin, 55% to 36%. Republicans, on the oth­er hand, sup­port­ed these pros­e­cu­tions, 56% to 33%. Independents were near­ly even­ly split (46% to 45% against), as were like­ly vot­ers as a whole (46% to 45% in support).

“These results show that the death penal­ty as it actu­al­ly works in America is dis­fa­vored by vot­ers of all polit­i­cal stripes,” the poll­sters wrote. ​“And they send a strong mes­sage to local pros­e­cu­tors who serve as the gate­keep­ers of capital punishment.”