The incoming Trump team blasted President Biden on Monday for his move that nearly cleared out the federal government’s death row.
Mr. Biden announced Monday that he would commute the sentences of 37 of the 40 murderers under federal sentence of death, explicitly saying he didn’t want Mr. Trump to resume federal executions.
Mr. Trump’s transition time blasted the “pardon decisions” in a statement Monday as “abhorrent.”
“These are among the worst killers in the world and this abhorrent decision by Joe Biden is a slap in the face to the victims, their families, and their loved ones,” Communications Director Steven Cheung said.
“President Trump stands for the rule of law, which will return when he is back in the White House after he was elected with a massive mandate from the American people,” he said.
The rule of law, however, means that Mr. Biden’s commutations are neither reviewable by courts nor reversible by Mr. Trump or any future president.
Mr. Biden’s move was not quite that of a principled abolitionist though, as he only commuted the death sentences of 37 of 40 murderers.
The three exceptions were probably the three highest-profile cases: the White murderer in an attack on a South Carolina Black church, the anti-Semite who committed the massacre at a Pennsylvania synagogue, and the Boston Marathon bomber.
Mr. Biden’s Monday statement explained those exceptions by saying they were all hate- or terrorism-related killings.
• Victor Morton can be reached at vmorton@washingtontimes.com.
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