The Department of Justice (DOJ) has authorized firing squads, electrocution, and gassing as a means of execution in federal cases.
In a press release on April 24, the department said it was directing the Bureau of Prisons to expand its execution protocol to include firing squads, lethal injection with pentobarbital, and other methods. It’s part of a broader report on the death penalty following President Donald Trump’s executive order to reinstate capital punishment at the federal level.
President Joe Biden had instituted a moratorium on executions and commuted the death sentences of almost all federal death-row inmates before he left office.
One of the first actions to be taken is to readopt the lethal injection protocol used during the first Trump administration. Trump also rescinded Biden administration policies the press release describes as “efforts to erode the death penalty.”
In addition to establishing a moratorium on federal death penalties and commuting the death sentences of 37 inmates on federal death row, the Biden administration discontinued lethal injection because it carried the risk of “unnecessary pain and suffering.”
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which opposes capital punishment, did not respond to a request for comment on this story. However, on its website it stated its opposition to Trump’s plans.
Hellbound and Down 