July 1, 2020

Supreme Court allows Trump administration to resume federal executions after 17-year pause

Supreme Court allows Trump administration to resume federal executions after 17-year pause
Hunter
Daily Kos Staff
Tuesday June 30, 2020 · 1:01 PM EDT


Though it was buried in yet another frantic news day, on Monday the Supreme Court allowed the Trump administration to resume federal executions by letting stand an appeals court ruling allowing the same. After a 17-year pause, the 60 prisoners on federal death row will now face new execution dates.

It was Attorney General William Barr, of course, who had indicated that his department would be lifting the hiatus. The death penalty remains a staple of "tough on crime" conservatism despite both the cost and ineffectiveness as deterrent; surely, there is no political stance quite as manly as demanding the death of criminals.

The details of the challenges now swept aside by the Supreme Court deal with the method of execution. The letter of the law requires federal executions to be conducted according to the laws of the state the sentencing took place in, but in multiple states execution by lethal injection, the most popular method, has been put on hold because drug companies have refused to allow states to purchase their products for the purpose of killing people. (Bad publicity.) Barr instead announced that the federal government would be using a different drug, pentobarbital, regardless of state protocols. An appeals court and the Supreme Court have now green-lit that approach.

Barr's eagerness to resume state-sponsored killings is unsurprising, given his conservatism, his well-known religious fervor, and his seeming obsession with the same tenets of authoritarian rule that have governed all other dealings. It is likely he wants to be able to execute people before the November elections, to give "tough on crime" conservatives a little pick-me-up helping to justify reelecting a "delusional" idiot manchild. (Spare me the faux outrage, every conservative "pundit." Any claim that Barr is handling his office in an apolitical fashion is at this point so absurd that it would require hosing down your pants before saying it, just to avoid the subsequent severe burns.)

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https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/6/30/1957188/-Supreme-Court-allows-Trump-administration-to-resume-federal-executions-after-17-year-pause