Calling for the Abolition of the Federal Death Penalty

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Ms. STEVENS. Madam Speaker, I rise today to condemn the use of capital punishment in the United States and to call for its abolition.

Capital punishment is an unjust and inhumane practice. It is past time we join developed democracies throughout the world and abolish this barbaric practice.

The death penalty in the United States is deeply unfair and inequitable. It is a sentence disproportionately given to people of color, individuals with mental illness and the economically disadvantaged. Black people make up less than 13 percent of the nation's population while accounting for more than 42 percent of those on death row. And despite the Supreme Court ruling that intellectual disability lessens moral culpability, an estimated five to ten percent of all death row inmates suffer from a severe mental illness. The death penalty is also overwhelmingly imposed on poor people, with 95 percent of death row defendants from underprivileged backgrounds.

The methods of execution used in the United States are unquestionably inhumane. States still allow people to be put to death by hanging, firing squad, electrocution and gas chamber. Although the recent adoption of lethal injection is purportedly more humane, recent botched executions have resulted in agonizing and prolonged deaths for individuals--undeniably a cruel and unusual punishment.

As long as the death penalty exists, innocent individuals will be convicted and sentenced to death. Since 1973, 172 former death-row prisoners have been exonerated of all charges related to the wrongful convictions that had put them on death row. We cannot continue to employ a system of punishment that has such a high risk of taking innocent life.

The United States stands out among our allies and other democracies in its use of the death penalty. Many of our allies consider it a gross violation of human rights. Defending human rights abuses abroad has been a key pillar of U.S. foreign policy, but the continued use of the death penalty at home undermines our global standing and enables other countries to criticize other diplomatic efforts.

Under the Trump Administration's Department of Justice, executions of federal death-row prisoners have recently resumed for the first time since 2003. In the midst of our current public health crisis, the Department of Justice has executed more people in six months than the total number executed over the previous six decades.

Most Americans know that the death penalty does not represent justice in our country. It is cruel, inhumane, arbitrary and clearly discriminatory. It is time for us to finally abolish the death penalty.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source