State & Federal Info

Federal Death Penalty

The federal government can seek death sentences for a limited set of crimes, but federal executions are much more rare than state executions.

Overview

The fed­er­al death penal­ty applies in all 50 states and U.S. ter­ri­to­ries but is used rel­a­tive­ly rarely. There are 40 pris­on­ers on the fed­er­al death row, most of whom are impris­oned in Terre Haute, Indiana. Sixteen fed­er­al exe­cu­tions have been car­ried out in the mod­ern era, all by lethal injec­tion, with 13 occur­ring in a six-month peri­od between July 2020 and January 2021.

The fed­er­al death penal­ty was held uncon­sti­tu­tion­al fol­low­ing the Supreme Court’s opin­ion of Furman v. Georgia in 1972. Unlike the quick restora­tion of the death penal­ty in most states, the fed­er­al death penal­ty was not rein­stat­ed until 1988, and then only for a very nar­row class of offens­es. The Federal Death Penalty Act of 1994 great­ly expand­ed the num­ber of eli­gi­ble offens­es to about 60.

The use of the fed­er­al death penal­ty in juris­dic­tions that have them­selves opt­ed not to have cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment — such as Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, and many states — has raised par­tic­u­lar con­cerns about fed­er­al over­reach into state matters.

News & Developments

News

Dec 09, 2024

Religious Groups, Former Corrections Officials, Pro-life Voices, and Many Others Urge President Biden to Commute Federal Death Sentences

In let­ters released on December 9, 2024, hun­dreds of stake­hold­ers urged President Joe Biden (pic­tured) to com­mute all fed­er­al death sen­tences before his term ends, cit­ing racial bias, sys­temic arbi­trari­ness, and the fail­ure of the fed­er­al death penal­ty to enhance pub­lic safe­ty. This col­lec­tive request reflects broad, bipar­ti­san acknowl­edge­ment of the flaws in the cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment sys­tem and aligns with the nation­al down­ward trend of sup­port for the death penal­ty, now at his­toric lows. 40…

Read More

News

Nov 27, 2024

Biden Contemplates Federal Commutation Requests

On November 25, 2024, President Joe Biden par­doned two Thanksgiving turkeys, an annu­al, sym­bol­ic tra­di­tion that high­lights the president’s con­sti­tu­tion­al author­i­ty to issue par­dons and com­mu­ta­tions. Now, as President Biden sets to leave office in January 2025, 60 mem­bers of Congress and many oth­ers are urg­ing him to grant clemen­cy to the 40 men cur­rent­ly on fed­er­al death row. During his 2020 pres­i­den­tial cam­paign, President Biden said he would work to abol­ish the fed­er­al death penalty but…

Read More

News

Nov 14, 2024

New DPI Report Connects Modern Use of Federal Death Penalty to its Racially Biased History

On Thursday, the Death Penalty Information Center (“DPI”) released a new report detail­ing the trou­bling racial his­to­ry of the fed­er­al death penal­ty. Fool’s Gold: How the Federal Death Penalty Has Perpetuated Racially Discriminatory Practices Throughout History doc­u­ments how racial dis­crim­i­na­tion has been a through­line in the appli­ca­tion of the fed­er­al death penal­ty since the 1800s. The report explains that, despite often being mis­char­ac­ter­ized as the…

Read More

News

Sep 03, 2024

Articles of Interest: The New York Times Editorial Board Argues United States ​“Does Not Need the Death Penalty”

In an August 31, 2024, edi­to­r­i­al from The New York Times, the newspaper’s edi­to­r­i­al board writes that cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment is ​“immoral, uncon­sti­tu­tion­al and use­less as a deter­rent to crime,” and asserts that President Joseph Biden should fol­low through with his cam­paign pledge to end the fed­er­al death penal­ty. The Times believes ​“it would be an appro­pri­ate and humane finale to his pres­i­den­cy for Mr. Biden to ful­fill that pledge and try to elim­i­nate the death penal­ty for federal…

Read More

News

May 06, 2024

Secret Execution Drug Supplier Confirmed, While Federal Death Penalty Reviews Continue at Department of Justice

Recent report­ing by The Intercept con­firms a sto­ry aired in April 2024 on Last Week Tonight with John Oliver iden­ti­fy­ing Connecticut-based Absolute Standards as the source of the exe­cu­tion drugs used in 13 fed­er­al exe­cu­tions in 2020 and 2021. Absolute Standards pro­duces mate­ri­als for cal­i­brat­ing research equip­ment, but in 2018, it applied to the Drug Enforcement Administration to be reg­is­tered as a bulk pro­duc­er of pen­to­bar­bi­tal, the anes­thet­ic used in fed­er­al exe­cu­tions and in many…

Read More
View More