Newsom moves to commute 548 death sentences, emptying California’s death row
California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) on Thursday said he has started the process of commuting the death sentences of more than 500 state prisoners—a historic move that, if successful, would empty the nation’s largest death row and eliminate about a quarter of all death sentences nationwide.
Newsom, who has been weighing a mass commutation for months, announced the sweeping move just days after Democrats notched a resounding victory in the midterm elections, giving the party control of Congress and flipping several states blue. Newsom, who will leave office in January, is weighing a 2028 presidential run.
A longtime critic of capital punishment, the governor began his first term by ordering California’s first moratorium on executions, dismantling the state’s death chamber and repealing its lethal injection protocol. If approved by the courts, this mass commutation will cement Newsom as the most anti-death-penalty governor in the state’s history.
In a letter to California residents, Newsom said he is seeking to change the sentences of all 548 death row prisoners to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
He called the decision “among the most difficult” of his career. Newsom wrote in his letter that commuting the sentences “will always weigh heavily” on him, but that he felt “compelled to follow my conscience.”
“Many Californians feel that those who commit brutal crimes deserve to die,” Newsom said in his letter. “But as Governor, I have concluded the state cannot morally kill them.”
He called the state’s death penalty system “a failure” that “has not been and cannot be fairly applied and has resulted in the conviction of innocent people.”
“I take this action because I firmly believe that state-sanctioned killing is incompatible with California’s values, undermines the foundation of our legal system, and diminishes each of us,” the governor said.
The state does not allow a governor to unilaterally commute the sentences of those with numerous felony convictions outside their capital murder cases, which account for about 70 percent of the state’s death row prisoners.
In those cases, the state Supreme Court will need to review Newsom’s clemency grants. At least four of the court’s seven justices must sign-off on the commutation for it to take effect.
Newsom wrote that he is “confident” the mass commutation is consistent with California law, but acknowledged this act of clemency requires the court to “participate in a weighty decision they did not choose to take up and with which they may personally disagree.”
California has not carried out an execution since 2006.
Newsom’s move was welcomed by Amnesty International and a mix of civil rights leaders, business officials, Hollywood actors and advocates for criminal justice reform. That included victims’ relatives like Annie Nichol and Jess Nichol, whose sister, 12-year-old Polly Klaas, was kidnapped and killed in 1993 by a man who remains on California’s death row.
“We don’t forgive the person that killed Polly,” Annie Nichol said in an interview Thursday. “But we also know that the death penalty is wrong.”
The Nichol sisters met with Newsom earlier this year at San Quentin prison, the former home of California’s death row, to discuss issues including their opposition to the death penalty. The family’s advocacy had helped reshape California’s justice system, but the sisters’ views on justice have evolved and they became uncomfortable with laws passed and upheld in Polly Klaas’s name.
“I believe that victims deserve the opportunity to heal and to grow, and the story of our loss and pain to change with time,” said Annie Nichol, who works as a survivor advocate with Crime Survivors Speak. “Just like people inside also deserve that opportunity, rather than having this capital punishment that’s irreversible.”
Other families of murder victims have viscerally opposed mass commutation, saying it feels like stolen justice. Ahead of Thursday’s announcement, some district attorneys and victim advocates urged the governor to leave death row alone—and hinted at legal challenges if he issued a mass commutation.
The move could have political repercussions, too, as critics come after Newsom and other Democrats for their criminal justice policies. But commuting the sentences could also win him credit with those weary of the justice system and reform advocates who have long been concerned about wrongful convictions and documented racial disparities in death sentences.
Newsom acknowledged that tension in his letter, writing that he understands his move will “anger and hurt some Californians.” He described seeking counsel from crime victims, public safety experts and religious and civil rights leaders.
“I deeply respect the views of those who will strongly disagree with my decision, including some families of victims who have suffered the worst possible loss,” Newsom wrote. “I hold this painful truth along with the belief that this is a righteous action.”
Governors in other states, including Oregon and Illinois, have commuted their own death rows, but none were nearly as large as California’s.
Shortly before leaving office, President Joe Biden commuted the sentences of 37 of the 40 people on federal death row, a move that has drawn sharp criticism from President Donald Trump and his allies.
While the death penalty used to be widely popular nationwide, support for it has dropped significantly. Still, despite a decline in executions nationwide, the pace of state-sanctioned killings has accelerated recently in some Republican-led states as the Trump administration has pushed for more capital punishment.
The District and 23 states have abolished the death penalty, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, but it remains on the books in 27 states and the federal system.
Five of those states currently have moratoriums blocking executions—including Tennessee, where Gov. Bill Lee (R) paused them this fall after prison officials botched the lethal injection of convicted killer Christa Pike. Her unprecedented survival of two doses of pentobarbital is the subject of ongoing litigation and an independent investigation.
In four death penalty states currently led by Republicans, Democrats will take over next year, potentially setting the stage for additional executive moves curtailing capital punishment.
Throughout his political career, Newsom has been clear on his strong opposition to the death penalty. He imposed a moratorium on executions in March 2019 and closed the state’s death chamber at San Quentin State Prison, moving those on death row into the general prison population.
“My ultimate goal is to end the death penalty in California,” Newsom said at the time.
His mass commutation effectively does just that, for now, though the death penalty remains legal and prosecutors in some counties are still pursuing capital cases. Capital punishment opponents in the state have tried, unsuccessfully, to end the death penalty by ballot measure.
In a letter to Newsom ahead of his decision, Dan Dow, district attorney of San Luis Obispo County, wrote that a universal act of clemency would rob victims’ families of the individual consideration their cases warranted.
Dow has also repeatedly emphasized his belief that any act of clemency—including this mass commutation—should explicitly acknowledge the names of the people killed by those on California’s death row.
In a statement Thursday, Dow lambasted Newsom for not naming any capital murder victims, including the three from his county.
“Governor Newsom just told the families of Rachel Newhouse, Aundria Crawford, Kesha Gurke and every other innocent victim of California’s 548 condemned killers that the killers’ lives matter more,” Dow said. “Juries chose justice case by case, voters chose it five times, and one outgoing governor is trying to erase it all with a pen. This is a sickening abuse of power.”
Nathan Hochman, the Los Angeles County district attorney, said in a separate statement that he will continue to pursue death sentences when he thinks the crime warrants it.
Before Thursday’s announcement, the governor had been openly wrestling with the idea and said on his podcast last month that he had lots of “people in my ear” saying not to do it.
But he told guest Bryan Stevenson, a prominent lawyer and death penalty opponent, that he was thinking hard about the issue.
“I have to prepare for my own conscience, my rocking chair test,” Newsom told Stevenson. “Do I commute the largest death row in the Western Hemisphere?”
“I think you do,” Stevenson answered, “and I think it becomes a really pivotal moment in this country.”
During their conversation with Newsom at San Quentin, the Nichol sisters said the governor seemed surprised by their perspective, asking them about their personal paths toward death penalty opposition.
Jess Nichol said she didn’t always feel this way, but the more work she did with other crime survivors, the more she felt herself letting go of vengeance.
“I may still have feelings of anger, but it’s not where I’m primarily living,” Jess Nichol said. “I believe our process of healing becomes our process of discovering justice for ourselves. It’s not just something you can prescribe to somebody. We need to discover for ourselves what true justice is.”
Write a letter to the editor, share a story tip or update, or report an error._(1).jpg)
