US Bishops call for President Biden to commute federal death row

By Devin Watkins

“As President Biden prepares to leave office, please urge him to commute all current federal death sentences to terms of imprisonment before his term ends.”

The US Bishops made that appeal to Americans on the website of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB).

It came just a day after Pope Francis invited everyone to pray for “inmates on death row in the United States.”

“Let us pray that their sentence be commuted, changed,” said the Pope at the Sunday Angelus prayer. “Let us think of these brothers and sisters of ours and ask the Lord for the grace to save them from death.”

Extraordinary opportunity

In their appeal, the US Bishops said President Joe Biden has “an extraordinary opportunity to advance the cause of human dignity by commuting all federal death sentences to terms of imprisonment and sparing the lives of the 40 men currently on federal death row.”

The campaign website also offers Americans a contact form to assist them in writing to President Biden.

The US federal government has the power to seek capital punishment for a limited set of crimes, with most death sentences handed down by state courts.

The Bishops recalled their long-standing opposition to capital punishment, which dates back to 1974.

The death penalty, they said, precludes the possibility for rehabilitation and reform, leads to extensive anguish for everyone involved, is carried out in an unfair and discriminatory manner, and involves the possibility of mistakes.

The US Bishops pointed to Pope Francis’ 2018 change to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which states that “the Church teaches, in the light of the Gospel, that ‘the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person’, and she works with determination for its abolition worldwide.”

Coinciding with start of Jubilee of Hope

A growing number of advocacy groups have joined forces to urge President Biden to commute the federal death row.

The Catholic Mobilizing Network (CMN) has spearheaded the Catholic movement to abolish the death penalty in the US, taking the end of President Biden’s term as a unique opportunity.

In an interview with Vatican News in November, Krisanne Vaillancourt Murphy, CMN Executive Director, said the President has the “constitutional authority and power to take action to commute the federal death row."

President Biden’s term ends on January 20, 2025, overlapping for nearly a month with the 2025 Jubilee of Hope, which starts on Christmas Eve 2024.

The Biblical tradition of the Jubilee year, said Ms. Vaillancourt Murphy, offers Catholics, including President Biden, a “time to rebalance and recommit to justice and mercy.”