USA | The Rarity of Clemency Grants

Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist once explained that exec­u­tive clemen­cy is intend­ed to oper­ate as the ​“fail safe” of the cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment sys­tem. It is the final oppor­tu­ni­ty, after all legal avenues have been exhaust­ed, for an exec­u­tive to decide whether to spare a pris­on­er from exe­cu­tion. 

Most grants of indi­vid­ual clemen­cy come after con­sid­er­a­tion of one or more fac­tors, includ­ing evi­dence of offi­cial mis­con­duct or oth­er unfair legal process­es, inef­fec­tive assis­tance of coun­sel, inno­cence, or excessive sentencing.

Historically, clemen­cy was the exclu­sive purview of the monarch, who alone had the pow­er to save or con­demn. This pow­er was incor­po­rat­ed into the U.S. Constitution and in many state con­sti­tu­tions. In prac­tice, how­ev­er, clemen­cy grants for death-sen­tenced pris­on­ers are extreme­ly rare, geo­graph­i­cal­ly con­cen­trat­ed, and politicized.

 

Fact: Clemency Grants are Extremely Rare

“In argu­ing for the death penal­ty, the pros­e­cu­tor made explic­it ref­er­ence to [anoth­er mur­der] in argu­ing that Mr. Teleguz was so dan­ger­ous that he need­ed to be put to death. It was false infor­ma­tion, plain and sim­ple, and while I am sure that the evi­dence was admit­ted in a good-faith belief in its truth­ful­ness at the time, we now know that to be incor­rect. To allow a sen­tence to stand based on false infor­ma­tion and spec­u­la­tion is a vio­la­tion of the very prin­ci­ples of jus­tice our sys­tem holds dear.” -Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe, com­mut­ing the death sen­tence of Ivan Teleguz in 2017

From 1977 to 2021, 53.6% of clemen­cy grants occurred when the exec­u­tive was not a can­di­date for re-elec­tion – this per­cent­age ris­es to 84.6% when the exec­u­tive has the sole author­i­ty to grant clemen­cy.

While the pub­lic may per­ceive clemen­cy as an eleventh-hour safe­ty valve that will spare those unjust­ly sen­tenced to death, indi­vid­ual grants of clemen­cy are extreme­ly rare. Out of almost 10,000 indi­vid­u­als sen­tenced to death since 1972, only 86, or less than one per­cent have had their death sen­tences com­mut­ed. While the num­bers are still small, over that same peri­od, more than twice that num­ber, or just over 200 indi­vid­u­als, have been found inno­cent — that is, exon­er­at­ed and released from death row through the legal process.

 

Fact: Many States Have Never Granted Clemency to a Death-Sentenced Individual

Grants of clemen­cy are also con­cen­trat­ed in a rel­a­tive­ly small num­ber of states. Several states have nev­er par­doned a death-sen­tenced pris­on­er. Of the states that still retain the death penal­ty today, eleven have nev­er issued an indi­vid­ual grant of clemen­cy in the more than fifty years that com­prise the mod­ern death penal­ty. Three of these states (California, Oregon, and Pennsylvania) have a mora­to­ri­um in place on exe­cu­tions. The remain­ing states — Arizona, Kansas, Mississippi, Nebraska, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah and Wyoming — have also nev­er issued an indi­vid­ual grant of clemen­cy. Kansas, Mississippi, South Dakota, and Wyoming have nev­er grant­ed a sin­gle case of clemen­cy nor exonerated anyone.

Fact: Clemency Decisions are Political

DPI has pre­vi­ous­ly found clear evi­dence that elec­toral pol­i­tics play a sig­nif­i­cant role in clemen­cy deci­sions. From 1977 to 2021, 53.6% of clemen­cy grants occurred when the exec­u­tive was not a can­di­date for re-elec­tion – this per­cent­age ris­es to 84.6% when the exec­u­tive has the sole author­i­ty to grant clemen­cy. This sug­gests exec­u­tives almost exclu­sive­ly use their pow­er when they do not have to face vot­ers again — only four indi­vid­u­als received grants of clemen­cy when the gov­er­nor was run­ning for re-elec­tion. Some elect­ed offi­cials may wor­ry about ​“vot­er back­lash” but there is no empir­i­cal evi­dence sup­port­ing the the­o­ry that vot­ers will change their votes based on an executive’s clemen­cy deci­sions. Data from a Gallup Poll con­duct­ed in October 2023 also not­ed that 50% of respon­dents believe that the death penal­ty is applied unfair­ly, a record high, rais­ing ques­tions about how accu­rate­ly exec­u­tives are read­ing their con­stituents’ views about the death penal­ty and clemency.

One illus­tra­tive exam­ple is Missouri Governor Mike Kehoe’s denial of clemen­cy to Lance Shockley, who was exe­cut­ed on October 14, 2025. An October 2025 sur­vey found that Missouri vot­ers, by a bipar­ti­san two-thirds major­i­ty, sup­port­ed a com­mu­ta­tion of Mr. Shockley’s death sen­tence. Dr. Nicholas Scurich of the University of California, Irvine, found that 65% of the 440 reg­is­tered Missouri vot­ers sur­veyed sup­port­ed clemen­cy for Mr. Shockley when they learned the facts of his case, includ­ing majori­ties of every polit­i­cal par­ty affil­i­a­tion — only 19% of respon­dents out­right opposed clemen­cy. Voters who sup­port­ed clemen­cy ​“cit­ed doubts about the strength of the evi­dence, con­cerns about the fair­ness of the judi­cial process, and Shockley’s pos­i­tive con­duct and trans­for­ma­tion while incarcerated.”

Source: Death Penalty Information Center, Lani Lamoureux, December 1, 2025

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

— Oscar Wilde