The United States Department of Justice has released a sweeping 48-page policy document authorising the expansion of federal execution methods to include firing squads, lethal gas asphyxiation and electrocution, marking a significant intensification of the Trump administration's approach to capital punishment. The announcement on Friday also confirmed a return to the use of pentobarbital — a powerful sedative — for lethal injections, which Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche described as "the gold standard of lethal injection drugs."

Blanche framed the move as a correction of what he called the prior administration's failures, arguing that former President Joe Biden had "thwarted justice" by placing a moratorium on federal executions and commuting the sentences of 37 of the 40 inmates then on federal death row to life imprisonment in the final days of his presidency. The three inmates whose sentences were not commuted include the perpetrators of some of the most notorious mass killings in recent American history: the 2018 Pittsburgh synagogue shooting, the 2015 Charleston church massacre, and the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing. The Justice Department's new directive calls on the Federal Bureau of Prisons to identify new facilities — potentially in states that already permit alternative execution methods — and to consider expanding federal death row capacity.

The policy document argues that firing squads, electrocution and lethal gas are all consistent with the Eighth Amendment to the US Constitution, which prohibits "cruel and unusual punishments." Critics strongly disagree. Democratic Senator Dick Durbin called the measures "cruel, immoral, and discriminatory," saying the expansion of the federal death penalty would be "a stain on our history." Advocacy groups have long pointed out that capital punishment in the United States is disproportionately applied to racial minorities and the economically disadvantaged, and the Death Penalty Information Center estimates that at least 202 people have been exonerated since 1973 after being sentenced to death.

Firing squads remain rare in the modern United States, though their use has been growing at the state level amid persistent difficulties in sourcing lethal injection drugs — several pharmaceutical companies have refused to supply them, and the European Union banned their export for this purpose in 2011. Five states currently permit the method: Idaho, Utah, Oklahoma, Mississippi and South Carolina, the last of which carried out three firing squad executions in 2025. A significant legal constraint on federal executions is that under existing law, they must be conducted in states that permit capital punishment and in accordance with those states' own protocols. The Justice Department acknowledged this limitation and recommended identifying a suitable new federal execution site.

Trump has long championed the death penalty — his advocacy dates back to at least 1989, when he took out full-page newspaper advertisements calling for its reinstatement following a high-profile attack in New York's Central Park. During his first term, he ended a nearly 20-year informal moratorium on federal executions, overseeing 13 executions in total. Since returning to office in January 2025, he has signed executive orders directing the Justice Department to pursue capital punishment broadly, including in cases where undocumented immigrants are convicted of killing law enforcement officers. The department says it has already sought the death penalty for 44 defendants and that Blanche has personally authorised it in nine cases.