Report: Biden Considering Commuting the Sentences of Inmates on Death Row

Lt. Johnathon Cuske leaves a corridor on death row and walks outside to what once was the
Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images, Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images

President Joe Biden is reportedly considering commuting the sentences of men on the federal death row list, according to a report from the Wall Street Journal.

People “familiar with the matter” reportedly told the outlet that Biden is reportedly “considering commuting” the sentences of “most, if not all” of the 40 men who are currently on the death row list.

Fox News’s Bill Melugin wrote in a post on X that “Charleston church mass shooter Dylan Roof and Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev are both on federal death row,” in response to reports that Biden is considering commuting the sentences of death row inmates.

The WSJ reported that if Biden does commute the sentences of the inmates on death row, “the prisoners, all convicted of murder, would serve life without parole.”

While a White House spokesman told the outlet that there was “no final decision,” some of the sources told the outlet that Biden could make a decision “by Christmas.”

A decision from the president could come by Christmas, some of the people said. A principal question is whether the president should issue a blanket commutation of all the condemned men, or whether death sentences should remain for the most heinous convicts, these people said.

As Breitbart News previously reported, at the beginning of December, Pope Francis called for people to pray “for those on death row in the United States,” and that the inmates’ “sentences may be commuted.”

“Let us #PrayTogether for those on death row in the United States,” Pope Francis wrote in a post on X. “Let us pray that their sentences may be commuted, changed. Let us think of these brothers and sisters of ours and ask the Lord for the grace to save them from death.”

In 2018, Pope Francis “amended the Catechism of the Catholic Church,” and declared capital punishment “inadmissible.”

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