Death Penalty News

Hillary Rodham Clinton   Less than a month before the New Hampshire primary in 1992, Bill Clinton left the campaign trail and tended to a pressing matter. Rickey Ray Rector, a convicted killer, was scheduled to be executed in Arkansas. Mr. Clinton, then the governor, returned to Little Rock and was present in the state when Mr. Rector was put to death, a detour that demonstrated his toughness on crime. Democrats "should no longer feel guilty about protecting the innocent," Mr. Clinton had said at a debate a few days earlier, emphasizing, in general, the need to punish criminals. Nearly a quarter-century later, Mr. Clinton's wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, has taken a strikingly different tone. While stopping short of calling for the death penalty's abolition, she urged a "hard look" at its use, saying it had been applied too frequently, and often in a discriminatory manner. Last week, she said she would "breathe a sigh of relief' if the S...

Democratic presidential candidates, from left, Bernie Sanders, Martin O’Malley, Hillary Clinton, November 2016. Less than 3 decades ago, calling for an end to the death penalty on the campaign trail could sink a candidate. Now, with public support for executions waning, Democrats are making it a key issue A generation ago, opposition to the death penalty ended political careers. Now, the 3 candidates sparring for the Democratic nomination are questioning the effectiveness and application of the death penalty. Among them, only former secretary of state Hillary Clinton opposes abolishing the practice, and only in certain cases. Former Maryland governor Martin O'Malley signed into law a repeal of the death penalty in his state in 2013 and commuted sentences of the state's remaining death row inmates in 2014. And Vermont senator Bernie Sanders has been a vocal opponent of the practice as matter or principle and policy. As the candidates prepare to square off a...

A day after Hillary Rodham Clinton said she opposed abolishing the death penalty , Senator Bernie Sanders took to the Senate floor on Thursday and declared that “the time is now for the United States to end capital punishment.” In seizing an opportunity to appeal to liberals who might be disappointed with Mrs. Clinton’s views, Mr. Sanders asserted that ending the death penalty was “the right point of view,” arguing that the government “should itself not be involved in the murder of other Americans.” “I would rather have our country stand side-by-side with European democracies rather than with countries like China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and others who maintain the death penalty,” Mr. Sanders said. He added that “at a time of rampant violence and murder all over the world,” the United States government should “say loud and clearly that we will not be part of that process.” “I think that those of us who want to set an example — who want to say that we have got to end the ...