President Joe Biden’s sweeping commutations for federal death row inmates on Monday notably excluded three non-Black men, including an open white supremacist who committed a hate-filled murder spree against nine unsuspecting parishioners at a historic Black church in South Carolina.
While Dylann Roof, who stated that he wanted to start a “race war” with his murderous actions, awaits execution for that fateful day at Mother Emanuel AME Church in 2015, he will be able to reflect on how Biden commuted the sentences of every single Black person serving federal death sentences, as well as 22 others from various backgrounds. 15 Black men, six Latinos, and one Asian have had their federal death sentences commuted.
A total of 37 federal death sentences have been commuted.
While Biden did not name the death row inmates by name, he reiterated his calls for the United States to “stop the use of the death penalty at the federal level,” which President-elect Donald Trump has promised to resume once he takes office.
Roof’s exclusion from Biden’s commutations raises the prospect of Trump, a suspected white supremacist, ordering the execution of an avowed white supremacist.
In 2021, Biden’s Department of Justice declared a moratorium on federal death sentences.
He stated on Monday that the commutations should not be interpreted as approval of the crimes for which convictions still stand. The only difference is that the prisoners will not face execution.
“I condemn these murderers, grieve for the victims of their despicable acts, and ache for all the families who have suffered unimaginable and irreparable loss,” the vice president stated.
The other two death row inmates whose sentences were not commuted are Robert D. Bowers, the gunman in a deadly mass shooting at a Pittsburgh synagogue in 2018, and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, one of the Boston Marathon bombers who planted deadly explosives at the race’s finish line in 2013.
Civil rights activists applauded Biden’s commutes.
“For more than fifty years, the NAACP has fought to abolish the death penalty. We know that Black Americans are disproportionately targeted and frequently wrongfully convicted of inhumane executions by the very government tasked with protecting their life and liberty,” NAACP President & CEO Derrick Johnson said in a statement to NewsOne. ”
We’re proud to see the Biden-Harris administration make history by sparing the lives of these individuals and setting an important precedent in the face of rising extremist and anti-humanitarian rhetoric and policy.”
According to Janai Nelson, President and Director-Counsel of the Legal Defense Fund, “commutations are a momentous step towards redressing the death penalty’s long history of racialized, systemic violence and its inefficacy as a form of punishment.”
Both Johnson and Nelson urged Biden to make similar decisions at the state level.
“The President still has the power to commute the sentences of more than 7,000 Americans impacted by the inherently racist ‘War on Drugs.'” Johnson added.
Nelson pointed out that thousands of other prisoners facing state-sanctioned executions were “incarcerated under sentences they would not receive under today’s laws, as well as the many other individuals who are serving unfair sentences as a result of unjust laws and practices.”
Biden’s son Hunter’s federal conviction for failing to pay federal income tax and illegally possessing a weapon was pardoned earlier this month, increasing pressure on the presidential communications.
Civil rights organizations, activists, and advocates sent Biden a number of letters urging him to commute the death penalty, including one signed by Rev. Sharon Risher, the daughter of Ethel Lance, who was killed by Roof in the racist mass shooting in Charleston, South Carolina.
Since Richard Nixon’s presidency, no first-term president has granted as many commutations as Biden.
In 2021, the United States Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal of Roof’s conviction, but there are still ways for him to continue the appeal process, making it unclear when he will be executed.
This is America.
