A spokesperson for President-elect Trump lashed out on Monday in opposition to President Biden‘s determination to commute the dying sentences of 37 inmates on federal dying row, calling the transfer a “a slap within the face to the victims, their households, and their family members.”
In a brief assertion, Steven Cheung, Trump’s communications director, famous the completely different approaches to crime between Biden and Trump.
“These are among the many worst killers on the planet and this abhorrent determination by Joe Biden is a slap within the face to the victims, their households, and their family members,” he mentioned in a press release. “President Trump stands for the rule of regulation, which can return when he’s again within the White Home after he was elected with a large mandate from the American folks.”
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Social media erupted on Monday after President Biden introduced he would commute the sentences of almost all of the inmates on federal dying row. (AP )
The White Home introduced that Biden was commuting the dying sentences to life with out the potential for parole on Monday. Among the many victims of the 37 males are regulation enforcement officers, youngsters and different inmates.
“Biden’s determination is a slap within the face to the victims and to the households of the victims that thought justice was going to be served,” Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., wrote on X.
Many different Republican lawmakers echoed the identical reactions.
Biden believes the federal dying penalty ought to solely be imposed for acts of terrorism and hate-motivated killings, the White Home mentioned.
“When President Biden got here into workplace, his Administration imposed a moratorium on federal executions, and his actions right now will forestall the subsequent Administration from finishing up the execution sentences that may not be handed down underneath present coverage and apply,” the White Home mentioned.
Three federal inmates whose dying sentences weren’t commuted are Robert Bowers, who’s accountable for the mass taking pictures on the Tree of Life Synagogue in 2018, which left 11 folks useless; Dylann Roof, a White supremacist who killed 9 Black parishioners at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015; and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who labored along with his now-dead brother to perpetrate the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing that killed three folks and injured a whole lot.
Biden mentioned the transfer would forestall the incoming Trump administration from finishing up the executions.
“In good conscience, I can’t stand again and let a brand new administration resume executions that I halted,” he mentioned.
The motion got here after Biden commuted the sentences of almost 1,500 prisoners positioned in residence confinement through the COVID-19 pandemic and pardoned 40 others, including his son, Hunter.
As of Dec. 13, Biden has pardoned a complete of 65 people and commuted sentences for 1,634 inmates throughout his time as president, based on the Division of Justice.
Hunter Biden flashes an enormous smile as he leaves an Arby’s in Santa Barbara on Wednesday, December 4, 2024. That is the primary time that the son of President Joe Biden has been photographed since he was pardoned by his father. (The Picture Direct for Fox Information Digital)
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“The President has issued extra sentence commutations at this level in his presidency than any of his latest predecessors on the identical level of their first phrases,” White Home officers mentioned in a earlier assertion.
Trump has taken a tricky stance on the dying penalty, beforehand suggesting that drug sellers must be eligible for the final word punishment.
“We’ll be asking everybody who sells medicine, will get caught promoting medicine, to obtain the dying penalty for his or her heinous acts,” Trump mentioned earlier this yr on the marketing campaign trial. “As a result of it is the one approach.”
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