Biden could foil Trump's plans to resume federal executions

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

54% : The completion of the department's review could be seen as part of the "Trump-proofing" that liberal activists are urging Biden appointees to carry out before Trump is inaugurated next month.
51% : "One development this week raised the spirits of death penalty opponents: Biden spoke by phone with Pope Francis and agreed to visit him in Rome next month on what will likely be the last foreign trip of Biden's presidency.
45% : Early last year, Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco ordered changes to some regulations on death penalty approvals as well as scheduling of executions, reversing some changes made during Trump's first term that allowed the unusual series of executions.
45% : However, the high court sometimes objected to Trump appointees' reversals of earlier government policies in areas like immigration and the census.
43% : Those men are some of the most well-known on federal death row: Robert Bowers, convicted in the mass shooting in 2018 at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh; Dylan Roof, convicted of the deadly shooting spree at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015; and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, convicted for his involvement in the bombing at the Boston Marathon finish line in 2013.
42% : One reason for the long pause was lawsuits challenging how lethal injection was administered.
42% : "We know who's on death row -- people with disabilities, people of color -- and he left them without a consideration."
38% : Daniel Lee was a convicted murder who had ties to white supremacy groups and had been on death row for some 20 years before he was executed in July 2020.
37% : The Justice Department has quietly recommended that Biden grant commutations to most of the 40 people on death row, according to a person familiar with the discussions not authorized to discuss them publicly.
37% : If he grants sweeping clemency to those prisoners, one big question is whether he will commute all 40 sentences to life in prison, or whether he'll leave death sentences in place for a handful of notorious criminals.
35% : Moreover, any changes Trump or his appointees make to the death penalty process will almost certainly face legal challenges.
35% : Prior to Trump's first term, there had been a nearly two-decade hiatus on federal executions, with the previous one taking place in 2003.
33% : "There's a legacy that [the Biden administration] can have," said Monifa Bandele with the Movement for Black Lives, which advocates for abolishing the death penalty.
22% : If Biden went that far, he would stymie Trump's ability to immediately resume federal executions, which have been on hold under Biden.
18% : "We hope the review will find that the problems with lethal injection are one additional reason as to why President Biden should grant clemency to death row prisoners," said Ruth Friedman, who oversees death penalty work for the federal defenders nationwide.
15% : Dunham said that even if Trump's Justice Department initiated a slew of new death penalty prosecutions, it would be difficult to go through the process of conviction, sentencing and appeals before Trump is slated to leave office in 2029.
12% : A dozen more inmates were put to death before Trump left office in January 2021, described by some as "Trump's killing spree.
9% : "On the campaign trail in 2024, Trump vowed he'd resume executions, including of migrants who commit violent crimes in the U.S."I'm hereby calling for the death penalty for any migrant that kills an American citizen or a law enforcement officer," Trump said at a rally in October.
5% : Trump, however, would not be able to undo any commutations that Biden issues to people currently on death row.

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