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President Joe Biden is on his way out of the White House, but before leaving office, the 46th president is keeping things in line with his administration’s moratorium on the federal death penalty by commuting the sentences of most inmates on federal death row. And because those death row inmates are disproportionately Black (38%) and Latino (15%), many view the move as a good look towards racial justice in a legal system where racial justice is scarce.
https://twitter.com/WhiteHouse/status/1871284742231822546
“I’ve dedicated my career to reducing violent crime and ensuring a fair and effective justice system,” Biden said in a statement announcing that he would commute sentences for 37 of the 40 individuals on federal death row, according to thegrio. “Make no mistake: I condemn these murderers, grieve for the victims of their despicable acts, and ache for all the families who have suffered unimaginable and irreparable loss.”
Biden, who vowed to abolish the death penalty during his 2020 presidential campaign, did not extend this slew of commutations to the violent white supremacists and terrorists who are currently on death row. Those excluded inmates include Dylan Roof, who was sentenced to death in 2017 after he massacred nine congregants at a historic Black church in South Carolina.
From thegrio:
Only three death row inmates did not receive commutations from the president: Dylan Roof, who fatally shot nine Black Americans inside Mother Emanual AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015; Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, convicted for the Boston Marathon bombing in 2013; and Robert Bowers, who shot and killed 11 Jewish Americans at Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Yeah — no matter what side of the death penalty issue you stand on, we should all be able to agree that certain offenders simply are not worth fighting on behalf of.
Of course, it’s worth mentioning that Rev. Sharon Risher, the daughter of Ethel Lance and the cousin of Susie Jackson and Tywanza Sanders, all of whom were killed by Roof, disagreed that everyone isn’t worth saving and actually requested that Roof’s life be spared as well.
“I learned that my mother and my loved ones were gunned down by a white supremacist trying to start a race war. He is not an innocent man on death row, but he is a man. He has humanity, and I have been willing and worked hard to give forgiveness to [him],” Risher said. “I do not want him to die. To spend the rest of his life in prison? Yes. But not for him to die in the name of my family. We are urging you, President Biden. I hope you hear my words. I hope you get to hear the pain in my voice.”
Many people would say it’s fortunate Biden decided not to give Roof his life back despite Risher’s request. Black America would have been outraged, and rightfully so.
Meanwhile, advocates for abolishing the death penalty are celebrating the decision as a win for civil rights, especially for Black prison inmates who statistically receive harsher punishments than their white counterparts who commit the same crimes.
“By commuting these sentences, President Biden has done what no president before him was willing to do: take meaningful and lasting action not just to acknowledge the death penalty’s racist roots but also to remedy its persistent unfairness,” said Martin Luther King III, who publicly urged the president to commute the sentences of federal death row inmates. (thegrio noted that Donald Trump ordered the executions of 13 death row inmates during the final weeks of his first administration.)
Jamilla Hodge, CEO of Equal Justice USA, said President Biden’s commutation strikes a “blow against racism and a system that has always targeted Black people.”
“This action, aligned with your more recent pardons, reaffirms our shared belief in the dignity and value of all human life and the possibility of redemption in everyone,” Hodge continued.
