Skip to main content

USA | Trump says he will end moratorium on federal executions on his first day in office, and use full force of the law to go after major drug dealers and cop killers

Trump sat down with DailyMail.com for an interview at his Mar-a-Lago home. He talked about the campaign and his plans for day one in the White House.

Donald Trump says he will end the Justice Department moratorium on executions on his first day in office, and use the full force of the law to go after major drug dealers and cop killers.

The Trump campaign sees crime, in general, and Kamala Harris's record as a prosecutor in California, in particular, as areas where they can inflict damage on her presidential bid.

And in an exclusive interview with DailyMail.com, Trump laid out more details of his crime-fighting agenda starting with whether he would reverse the Biden-Harris administration's freeze on federal executions.  

'Of course I would. I would have executions on major drug dealers,' he said when asked if it would be a day-one priority. 

'I would have, perhaps, the raping of a child, the killing of a police officer. 

'I would have executions on the people that violently kill people.'

Trump's administration restored the use of the federal death penalty in 2019. And 13 federal death row inmates were executed, before Biden's Attorney General Merrick Garland announced a halt in July 2021.

Some 27 states have the death penalty on their books, although seven have also suspended executions.

Trump has brought up the theme of tougher penalties for a range of crimes on the campaign trail to portray himself as the candidate of law and order.

Last week he was at the border with Mexico where he highlighted the damage done by cartels and smugglers, and met with grieving mothers..

'We have people coming into this country. I just left a number of them last week, as you saw. at the border, where their daughters were killed, their sons were killed' he said. 

'Their sons were killed by thugs and migrants coming into our country, and they viciously ... they were viciously and violently killed and stuffed into garbage cans.'

Drug dealers responsible for hundreds of deaths should also face the ultimate sanction, he said. 

'The average drug dealer kills 500 people during that person's lifetime. I would have no problem with that. If you're going to stop the drug epidemic, you're going to have to have a death penalty,' he added.

Trump has used rallies and speeches to attack his election opponent, who rose from the San Francisco district attorney's office to become California attorney general, as soft on crime.

Last week, at a Michigan sheriff's office, he called her a police 'defunder' and a pro-crime 'Marxist prosecutor.' 

'We’re here today to talk about how we are going to stop the Kamala crime wave that is going on at levels that nobody’s ever seen before,' he said last Tuesday.

'She is, as you know, the most radical left person ever even thought of for a high office.'

For its part, the Harris campaign has shrugged off his attacks, painting the contest as a former prosecutor against a '34-time convicted felon,' in a reference to the New York hush money case in which Trump was found guilty on all counts.

And it accused him of lying 'about crime, which skyrocketed on his watch, about policing, which he tried to defund, and about the January 6 insurrectionists who attacked police officers defending our Capitol at his behest.

'Donald Trump can’t bring us together so he tries to drive us apart. The American people will reject his failed leadership and divisive agenda this November.'

Harris has enjoyed a bump in her poll and fundraising numbers since she became the Democratic nominee for president.

But Trump said he had won a string of key endorsements and felt his campaign had gone from strength to strength.

During the interview, in the gilded splendor living room of Mar-a-Lago—the club's most lavish reception room—also slammed Harris for waiting so long to give an interview, and laid out his unease with Florida's strict abortion law.

This issue is a tricky one for Trump as he tried to keep his evangelical supporters on board without alienating women voters.

He has tried to keep all sides happy by saying abortion is an issue for states to decide. But Florida, where he lives, is holding a referendum on expanding access to abortion from its newly enacted six-week limit. He said he had made up his mind on the issue.

'Well, I do know, but I do want more than six weeks,' he said. 'I want more than six weeks. 

'I think six weeks is a mistake. And I'll be expressing that soon, but I want more than six weeks. 

'And in Florida, we have a six-week program, and that's what I believe that you're voting on, and I think it should be more than six weeks.'

Source: Mail Online, Rob Crilly, August 30, 2024

_____________________________________________________________________








"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."

— Oscar Wilde



Most viewed (Last 7 days)

Arizona | Man who murdered pastor crucifixion style requests plea deal after parents killed in plane crash

Adam Sheafe, the California man who admitted to killing a New River, Arizona, pastor in a crucifixion-style attack, has asked prosecutors to offer him a plea deal that would result in a natural life sentence rather than the death penalty he had previously sought. Advisory council attorneys representing Sheafe sent a formal plea offer to prosecutors this week, about two weeks after his father and stepmother died in a plane crash at Marana Airport on April 8, according to 12 News. Sheafe, 51, is charged with first-degree murder in the death of William Schonemann, 76, pastor of New River Bible Church, who was found dead inside his home last April.

US Department of Justice announces decision to resume federal executions

The Department of Justice (DOJ) announced on Friday that it will resume the federal use of capital punishment and that it is seeking death sentences against 44 defendants. DOJ also said that it will use firing squads, electrocution, or nitrogen asphyxiation if the drug used in lethal injection is unavailable. The announcement follows the Restoring and Strengthening the Federal Death Penalty report, published on April 24. The report is especially critical of the moratorium on federal executions, ordered by Attorney General Merrick Garland in July 2021, to remain until the death penalty could be conducted “fairly and humanely.” Garland was concerned about the federal lethal injection protocol, which uses only one drug, pentobarbital, and the possibility that it causes “unnecessary pain and suffering.” In response to Garland’s moratorium and concerns, President Biden commuted the sentences of 37 prisoners on federal death row, leaving only three prisoners.

China | Man sentenced to death for murder executed in Yunnan

Tian Yongming, who was initially sentenced for a series of violent crimes and then had his sentence changed to death early this year, has been executed in Yunnan province following approval from China's top court. The execution was carried out by the Intermediate People's Court in Yuxi, Yunnan, on Tuesday, with local prosecutors supervising the process. Before the execution, Tian was allowed to meet with his family members. The case dates back to September 1996, when Tian was sentenced to nine years in prison for the rape and attempted murder of his sister-in-law. After his release on July 15, 2002, he plotted revenge against the woman. On the night of Nov 13, 2002, he broke into her home armed with a knife.

20 Minutes to Death: Witness to the Last Execution in France

The following document is a firsthand account of the final moments of Hamida Djandoubi, a convicted murderer executed by guillotine at Marseille’s Baumettes Prison on September 10, 1977. The record—dated September 9—was written by Monique Mabelly, a judge appointed by the state to witness the proceedings. Djandoubi’s execution would ultimately be the last carried out in France before capital punishment was abolished in 1981. At the time, President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing—who had publicly voiced his "deep aversion to the death penalty" prior to his election—rejected Djandoubi’s appeal for clemency. Choosing to let "justice take its course," the President allowed the execution to proceed, just as he had in two previous cases during his term:   Christian Ranucci , executed on July 28, 1976 and Jérôme Carrein , executed on June 23, 1977. Hamida Djandoubi , a Tunisian national, was sentenced to death for killing his former lover, Elisabeth Bousquet. He was execu...

Florida executes Chadwick Scott Willacy

STARKE, Fla. -- A Florida man who set his neighbor on fire after she returned from work to find him burglarizing her home was executed Tuesday evening. Chadwick Scott Willacy, 58, received a three-drug injection and was pronounced dead at 6:15 p.m. at Florida State Prison near Starke for the 1990 killing of Marlys Sather. It was Florida's fifth execution this year. The curtain to the execution chamber went up promptly at the scheduled 6 p.m. time, and the lethal injection got underway two minutes later, after Willacy made a brief statement.

Iran to execute first woman linked to mass protests after ‘forced confessions’

Bita Hemmati and three others have been sentenced to death for 'collusion' and 'propaganda.' Advocates claim the charges are baseless, citing a secretive process and state-televised interrogations. Iranian authorities are preparing to execute Bita Hemmati, the first woman sentenced to death in connection with the mass protests in Tehran in late December and January, according to the US-based non-profit the Human Rights Activists News Agency. Judge Iman Afshari, of Branch 26 of the Tehran Revolutionary Court, sentenced Hemmati, her husband, Mohammadreza Majidi Asl, and Behrouz Zamaninezhad, and Kourosh Zamaninezhad to death on the charge of “operational action for the hostile government of the United States and hostile groups,” in addition to discretionary imprisonment period of five years on the charge of “assembly and collusion against national security.”  

Tennessee | Man set to be executed files motion claiming DNA evidence will exonerate him

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Attorneys for death row inmate Tony Carruthers filed a motion in Shelby County Criminal Court seeking immediate DNA testing on evidence they claim will prove his innocence in a 1994 triple murder.  Carruthers is scheduled for execution on May 12. He was convicted and sentenced to death for the kidnapping and murders of 24-year-old Marcellos Anderson, 17-year-old Delois Anderson, and 21-year-old Frederick Scarborough. Prosecutors at trial alleged the victims were buried alive in a Memphis cemetery as part of a drug-related robbery.

Florida Schedules Two Executions for Late April

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Governor Ron DeSantis has directed the Florida Department of Corrections to move forward with two executions scheduled for late April 2026, marking a significant ramp-up in the state's use of capital punishment. The scheduled deaths of Chadwick Willacy and James Ernest Hitchcock follow a series of landmark judicial rulings that have kept both men on death row for decades.

Singapore executes man for trafficking 1kg of cannabis

SINGAPORE — Singaporean authorities executed Omar bin Yacob Bamadhaj at Changi Prison on Thursday, April 16, 2026, following his 2019 conviction for importing 1,009.1 grams of cannabis. Bamadhaj, 41, though some reports have cited his age as 46, was arrested on July 12, 2018, during a routine search at the Woodlands Checkpoint. Officers discovered the narcotics wrapped in plastic and hidden within his vehicle as he attempted to enter Singapore from Malaysia.  Under the Misuse of Drugs Act, the threshold for the mandatory death penalty involving cannabis is 500 grams, a limit this shipment exceeded by more than double.

Florida | Man avoids death penalty in Daytona Beach triple murder

Jerome Anderson shot and killed Antoine Melvin, 42, John Burch, 65, and Patrick Lassiter, 35, in 2023. A man pleaded no contest to a triple-murder in Daytona Beach and was sentenced April 20 to three consecutive life terms in prison as part of a plea deal in which he avoided a possible death sentence. Jerome Anderson, 41, was indicted on three counts of first-degree murder and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon in the 2023 triple-slaying. Anderson pleaded no contest to the three first-degree murder charges April 20 and, in exchange, Assistant State Attorney Andrew Urbanak agreed not to continue to pursue the death penalty.