The death penalty in the US remains in decline during 'the year of the botched execution,' analysis finds

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

45% : That figure has held steady in recent years, per Gallup: 2022 was the sixth consecutive year support for capital punishment was between 54% and 56% -- and below the 60% to 80% readings recorded between 1976 and 2016.
44% : Candidates who touted a general commitment to criminal justice reform were elected as prosecutors in jurisdictions previously responsible for a "disproportionate amount of death sentences and executions," DPIC's report says.
43% : Moreover, this year's relatively unwavering polling on support for the death penalty was striking, Dunham said, given perceptions of increased crime in an election cycle where crime ranked among the top issues for voters and Republican candidates made crime central to their messages and in political ads.
42% : And yet, those sentences were not imposed in what might be thought of as the most aggravated cases, the report notes, like that of the Parkland high school shooter, who got a life sentence after his Florida jury failed to unanimously recommend the death penalty.
40% :Still, given falloff in its use and public support, Dunham said, "I think the long-term prognosis for capital punishment in the US is that it remains on a downward trajectory."2022 was the eighth consecutive year in which US jurisdictions carried out fewer than 30 executions and imposed fewer than 50 new death sentences, Dunham told CNN, as federal executions remain temporarily halted.
39% : Twenty-seven states still have the death penalty, with their officials often saying its use provides justice to victims of capital murder and their relatives.
37% : Overall, public support for the death penalty remains similar to recent years, states the report released Friday, citing polling from Gallup that shows 55% of Americans say they are in favor of the death penalty for convicted murderers.
35% : "As the death penalty declines, the states that want to carry it out are engaging in more and more extreme conduct," said Robert Dunham, whose group says it's neither for nor against capital punishment but often is critical of how it's administered.
33% : The use and imposition of the death penalty in America saw a continued decline in 2022 as polls showed public support for capital punishment stayed near historic lows, according to a year-end report by the Death Penalty Information Center.
33% : The Texas Department of Criminal Justice disputed the characterization, saying media witnesses to the execution also did not describe it as botched.
31% : While several factors have contributed to what the non-profit describes as the death penalty's waning nature, the trend was illustrated perhaps most starkly this week when outgoing Democratic Gov. Kate Brown commuted the death sentences of all 17 inmates on Oregon's death row, calling capital punishment "dysfunctional and immoral."
26% : Gov. Kay Ivey, a Republican, then called for a moratorium on executions and a review of capital punishment in the state, though she blamed not state officials but "legal tactics and criminals hijacking the system" for the aborted executions.
20% : Cases like this highlight the disproportional and often arbitrary use of capital punishment and undermine the idea the death penalty is reserved for the "worst of the worst," the report notes.

*Our bias meter rating uses data science including sentiment analysis, machine learning and our proprietary algorithm for determining biases in news articles. Bias scores are on a scale of -100% to 100% with higher negative scores being more liberal and higher positive scores being more conservative, and 0% being neutral. The rating is an independent analysis and is not affiliated nor sponsored by the news source or any other organization.