Hacker News Reader

Comment by lostNFound | Hacker News Reader

But espionage is a Federal charge, which is currently under a execution stay, as has been for the past 2 non-trump decades.

Will Biden ever follow through on his promise of abolishing the penalty? Possible campaign topic again.

View on HN

Add it to the list of "things presidential candidates promise, but that the president doesn't have the capacity to implement". The death penalty is authorized by Congress; POTUS can tell the Justice Department not to do it or push for it in sentencing, but barring a legislative patch release the successor can always issue a new policy.

I agree and know this, it's more about how they are making promises they cannot keep. If Democrats ever get a majority in Congress again, and don't do it, however...

this isn't worth their time until they get through the big shit like poverty, healthcare reform, housing crisis / nimbyism, climate, homelessness, automation, etc.... world is on fire, I think a law like this is like what you tackle when you've solved poverty, climate change. world hunger, and homelessness

They aren't not trying [0]; it isn't the Democratic party that is blocking this.

On the other hand (and granted that the death penalty is a barbaric atrocity) I'm inclined to prefer the US federal government focus most of its reform efforts (even those contained to the justice system) on issues whose death rates average more than 0.25 people/year[1].

[0] https://pressley.house.gov/2023/07/13/pressley-durbin-reintr...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_executed_by_the...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com