Amnesty Report Demands Biden Take Action to End Death Penalty

International human rights group Amnesty International on Monday called on U.S. President Joe Biden to follow through on his campaign promise to eliminate the federal death penalty and commute the sentences of death row inmates as the country approaches the 50th anniversary of the landmark capital punishment case Furman v. Georgia.

In a new report, The Power of Example, the organization notes that Biden made history when he was elected as the first U.S. president to oppose the death penalty, asking, “Whither the Biden death penalty promise?”

“Except for a temporary moratorium on federal executions, in the 18 months since he entered the White House as president, little progress on his abolitionist pledge has been visible,” the report reads. “What is more, his administration’s defense of the sentences of all of those currently on federal death row—opposing relief and moving them closer to execution—is cause for concern.”

A year ago, Biden’s Department of Justice angered rights advocates by seeking the death penalty in the case of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who was convicted in 2015 of killing three people and injuring hundreds when he bombed the finish line of the Boston Marathon two years earlier.

The report released Monday “stems from Amnesty International’s concern that the clock is running on the Biden pledge with little to show for it.”

With the anniversary of Furman approaching this week, Amnesty said, now “is an opportune moment for the U.S. administration and members of Congress to be reminded that the world is waiting for the USA to do what almost 100 countries have achieved during this past half-century—total abolition of the death penalty.”

In Furman, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty is unconstitutional under the Eighth Amendment, which bans cruel and unusual punishment, temporarily abolishing the practice until a 1976 case reinstated it.

Anti-capital punishment advocates were relieved when Biden was elected in November 2020, following what Amnesty deputy research director Justin Mazzola called “a stark reminder of the horror show that is capital justice” when President Donald Trump resumed federal executions after a 17-year hiatus in July 2020.

The federal government executed 13 people between July 2020 and January 2021 “despite compelling legal claims, including those of racial discrimination, arbitrariness, inadequate legal representation, mental and intellectual disabilities, and prosecutorial misconduct,” said Mazzola.

“The USA has carried out more than 1,500 executions since Furman, even as it has labeled itself as a global human rights champion,” said Mazzola. “Yet international human rights law requires abolition of the death penalty within a reasonable timeframe.”

“The USA must finally recognize the death penalty as a human rights issue on which it should offer exemplary leadership,” reads the report, “not just to retentionist states within the country but to the diminishing list of countries that retain this punishment.”

Originally published at Commondreams.org, written by Julia Conley.