Executioners in Chief

In Trump’s last six months as president, thirteen people were put to death. Six were killed shortly after he lost the election, and he hurried to kill three more before leaving office in January 2021. As many noted then, there had been only three federal executions in total between 1963 and Trump’s presidency. The spree was in keeping with Trump’s longstanding support for the death penalty and his public demands for it to be used against those he thinks deserve it. It’s harder to figure out what motivates Joe Biden. He was for capital punishment before he was against it—an ardent supporter earlier in his political career but an abolitionist as a presidential candidate in 2020, when he called for “legislation to eliminate the death penalty at the federal level, and incentivize states to follow the federal government’s example.” Now, as the end of his first term approaches, he seems to be for it again.