Power of the Pardon
The Intercept Briefing
The Intercept
4.8 • 6.3K Ratings
🗓️ 20 December 2024
⏱️ 32 minutes
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Summary
Among a president’s most profound responsibilities is the power to grant clemency. Now, as President Joe Biden's first term winds down, he faces mounting calls to use that authority to commute the sentences of the 40 men on federal death row.
Donald Trump's final months in office marked a stark shift in federal execution policy. After a 17-year hiatus, his administration executed 13 people — the most under any president in over a century. While Biden halted this practice, advocates warn that a second Trump term could restart executions. It's why they're urging Biden to take decisive action now to reduce death penalty sentences to life without parole.
On this week's episode of The Intercept Briefing, reporter Liliana Segura examines the gap between candidate Biden's promises and his actions as president. “By far the most significant thing that Biden could do and should do in my opinion is to make good on his stated opposition to the death penalty, which is something he ran on in 2020. Joe Biden said that he wanted to try to bring legislation to end the federal death penalty and, in fact, incentivize states to do the same. He had language in his campaign platform talking about how life without parole sentences were appropriate alternatives,” she says.
According to Segura, the federal death penalty reaches far beyond the most notorious cases and its deterrent effect is questionable — challenging many Americans' assumptions. “This idea that the death penalty is a deterrent is like the myth that will not die. You know, I was in Indiana recently covering this midnight execution, and I'm looking at some of the rhetoric that is out there from the state attorney general, and he is banging that drum about, 'Oh, you know, this is a deterrent to crime.’ There's absolutely no evidence that that is true and there really never has been.”
To learn more about what Biden could do, listen to this week’s episode of The Intercept Briefing.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the Intercept Briefing. I'm Akala Lacey, your host this week. |
| 0:06.2 | The president has come under growing pressure to grant more clemencies before he leaves office. |
| 0:11.7 | One of the most consequential powers an outgoing president holds is the ability to grant clemency |
| 0:18.3 | to those convicted of federal crimes. As the clock runs out on President |
| 0:23.1 | Biden's term, pressure is mounting for him to wield that power decisively to address the federal |
| 0:29.1 | death penalty. You've never had massive amounts of drugs pouring into our country. We fought it like |
| 0:35.3 | hell. We were fighting. And by the way, you'll never solve |
| 0:39.3 | the problem without the death penalty. During his last term, Donald Trump ended a 17-year pause on |
| 0:46.0 | federal executions, carrying out 13 in just six months, more than any president in over a century. |
| 0:53.5 | While federal executions stopped during Biden's |
| 0:56.2 | administration, advocates fear Trump will continue where he left off and are imploring the president |
| 1:01.8 | to act swiftly. Joe Biden, today setting a new mark for outgoing presidents. This is the largest |
| 1:09.1 | single-day act of clemency in modern U.S. history. |
| 1:13.1 | He has, so far this month, commuted the sentences of 1,500 people who were moved from prison |
| 1:18.8 | to home confinement during the pandemic, pardoned 39 people convicted of nonviolent crimes, |
| 1:24.5 | and, most controversially, pardoned his son, Hunter. But for many, it's not enough. |
| 1:30.6 | Senator Bernie Sanders is urging Biden to preemptively pardon January 6th committee members, and perhaps |
| 1:36.6 | the loudest calls for mass clemency are for those on federal death row. In the 2020 election, |
| 1:43.3 | Biden campaigned to end the federal death penalty, |
| 1:46.3 | but he's been quiet on the issue ever since. With just weeks left in office, Democratic lawmakers, |
| 1:54.1 | advocates, and even the Pope are urging Biden to fulfill that promise before it's too late. |
| 2:00.5 | Joining me now is the Intercept Senior Reporter Liliana Seguera, who covered Trump's |
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