Capital punishment

Given that Donald Trump treats the office of the presidency like a personal branding tool, and deals with adversity like a two-bit mafioso, this moment was perhaps predictable: the president is reportedly considering pre-emptively pardoning three of his children, his son-in-law, and associates including Rudy Giuliani. He has already pardoned or commuted the sentences of several of his friends and associates, which should raise some eyebrows – why do so many people who surround this president wind up charged with a crime, in jail, or bracing themselves for criminal charges? And why is the supposedly law-and-order “pro-life” Republican party shrugging as this president excuses the criminality of his kin and his cronies while he refuses to intervene to save anyone from execution – and in fact, is using what little time he has left in office to reinstate barbaric practices like death by firing squad?We all know Trump didn’t drain the swamp. But in his last two months in office, he is sending a clear message about who and what he and his party value. It’s not Christian mercy, or hard-nosed law and order, or even the sanctity of life. It’s power, dominance and a thick line between two Americas: one connected, white, power-hungry and lawless, and the other at its mercy.As Trump’s term winds down, the White House is reportedly besieged with requests from lackeys and sycophants and hangers-on and D-list celebrities who all believe the president may grant them a get-out-of-jail-free card (or, in the case of his children and Giuliani, who have not been charged or convicted of any crimes, a get-out-of-ever-being-held-accountable card). Even the Tiger King has made his case to the president.Many expect that the president will issue a flurry of pardons and commutations, and this largesse will be bestowed much like the measly 11 pardons and commutations he’s issued so far: on people who worked for him, people who supported him, people could incriminate him and people who personally impress him (sometimes via reality television stars, because we are living in the worst of times).Trump has refused to use his powers for good, and has been appalling harsh on those who have been over-sentencedHe’s granted clemency almost entirely to his friends, advisers, supporters and loyalists, with a few war criminals and conservative cultural icons thrown in for good measure. The only people he has used his pardon power to help who fall outside that characterization are either famous but long-dead historical figures and Alice Marie Johnson, who was serving a life sentence for a non-violent drug offense – and whose case he only learned about because reality television star Kim Kardashian West brought it to his desk.What he largely hasn’t done is use the presidential clemency power for its highest purpose: to correct serious injustice and act with compassion.Despite touting himself as a president who has done more for criminal justice reform than any other, the opposite is actually true: Trump has refused to use his powers for good, and has been appalling harsh on those who have been over-sentenced. Several people on federal death row have appealed to the president for clemency – not to go home, just to not be killed by the state. So far, Trump has ignored them. The list of those who are still alive includes Brandon Bernard, who was just 18 when he joined a group of friends for what he thought was going to be a carjacking and a robbery; one of his friends ended up murdering the couple the group robbed, in a brutal act Bernard had not foreseen and was horrified by. At trial, Bernard’s lawyer, who had never argued a federal death penalty case before, barely mounted a defense and failed to call important witnesses. Several members of the jury that convicted him now say that he should not be executed. And there’s Lisa Montgomery, the only woman on federal death row, who committed an awful crime – she murdered a pregnant woman and stole her baby – but also has a severe and debilitating mental illness, and, her lawyers say, was psychotic when she committed that heinous crime. More