U.S. President Joe Biden commuted the sentences of 37 out of 40 federal death row inmates by converting them to life imprisonment without parole.
The three people excluded from the measure are the Boston Marathon bomber and the man who killed Jewish worshipers in 2018.
“I am more convinced than ever that we must end the use of the death penalty at the federal level,” Biden said in a statement. His bill does not include the more than 2,000 people sentenced to death by state authorities.
Biden’s decision comes before President-elect Donald Trump returned in January to resume federal executions while in office.
Among those released by Biden are nine people convicted of killing fellow inmates, four people accused of murder during a bank robbery, and one person accused of killing a prison guard.
“Make no mistake about it,” Biden added, “I condemn these murderers, I mourn the victims of their despicable acts, and I feel pain for every family who has suffered an unimaginable and irreparable loss.”
Len Davis, a disgraced former New Orleans police officer who ran a drug ring involving other officers and masterminded the murder of a woman, is among those who received a pardon.
The three men who remain on death row include Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who helped carry out the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, and Dylann Roof, a white supremacist who shot and killed nine black churchgoers in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015.
Robert Bowers, who killed 11 Jewish worshipers in a shooting at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue in 2018, also remains on death row.
Biden has campaigned against the death penalty, and the Justice Department has placed a moratorium on the use of the death penalty at the federal level since he became president.
Trump oversaw 13 countries during his first term. death by lethal injection During the last six months of his administration.
No federal prisoners had been executed in the United States since 2003 until Trump resumed federal executions in July 2020.
During his re-election campaign, Trump said he would expand the death penalty to include human traffickers, drug traffickers and immigrants who kill American citizens.
Biden appeared to be referring to President Trump’s intentions, saying in a statement, “I cannot in good conscience stand back and allow the new administration to resume the executions I stopped.”
Under U.S. law, such pardons cannot be revoked by the president’s successor.
The president’s announcement was criticized by some Republicans.
Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas said on X, formerly Twitter, that Democrats are “the politically expedient party of justice” after news of the commutations was made public.
“Once again, the Democratic Party has sided with corrupt criminals over victims, public order and common decency,” he said.
Biden’s decision does not affect people sentenced to death in state courts. About 2,250 Inmates, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. More than 70 state executions have occurred during Biden’s presidency.
The death penalty has been abolished in 23 of the 50 U.S. states. Six other states have implemented moratoriums, including Arizona, California, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania and Tennessee.
Earlier this month, Biden commuted the sentences of about 1,500 people and pardoned 39 people convicted of nonviolent crimes.
He also pardoned his son Hunter Biden, who is facing sentencing in two criminal cases. He pleaded guilty to tax charges in early September, and in June was found guilty of possession of a firearm while an illegal drug user, making him the first child of a sitting president to be convicted of a crime.
The U.S. Constitution provides that the president has broad powers to grant reprieves and pardons for crimes against the United States, except in cases of impeachment.
