Acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche speaks during a press conference at the Robert F. Kennedy Department of Justice Building on April 7, 2026 in Washington, DC.
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The U.S. government should add firing, electrocution and gas asphyxiation as methods of execution for people convicted of the most serious federal crimes, the U.S. Department of Justice said Friday in a report that cited difficulties in obtaining lethal injection drugs.
The report was a fulfillment of President Donald Trump’s promise to reinstate the death penalty during his second term. During his first term, which ended in 2021 and resumed after a 20-year hiatus, he executed 13 federal prisoners by lethal injection in his final months in office.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, who released the report, announced that President Trump had authorized the death penalty for nine people after his predecessor, Joe Biden, revoked a federal moratorium on executions.
“Among the steps taken are re-adopting the lethal injection protocol used during the first Trump administration, expanding the protocol to include additional execution methods such as firing squads, and streamlining internal processes to expedite death penalty cases,” the statement said.
“Under President Trump’s leadership, the Department of Justice is once again enforcing the law and standing with victims,” Blanche said.
In his report, Blanche directed the Justice Department’s Bureau of Prisons to amend its execution procedures to “include additional constitutional methods of execution currently provided for in certain state laws,” pointing to older methods such as shooting and electrocution, as well as a new gas asphyxiation law pioneered by Alabama in 2024.
“This amendment will help ensure that the Department is prepared to carry out lawful executions even if certain drugs are not available,” the report states.
Democrat Biden has commuted the sentences of 37 federal death row inmates awaiting execution, leaving only three remaining.
