Noting the dynamic state of death penalty debate in red states

This new lengthy  Stateline article, imperfectly headlined “Trump’s death penalty push faces resistance in some red states,” highlights a lot of recent state capital punishment developments.  I recommend the whole piece, and here are excerpts:

In an executive order he signed his first day in office, Trump directed… the U.S. Department of Justice to help states obtain lethal injection drugs, though it remains unclear how it will do so. The order also instructs the attorney general to encourage state attorneys general and district attorneys to pursue capital charges for all eligible crimes….

Each state has its own death penalty laws for state crimes.  But growing anti-death penalty sentiment in the states may limit the impact of Trump’s directive….

In conservative Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky and Ohio, Republican lawmakers have introduced bills to abolish the death penalty. In Georgia, the House earlier this month approved a bill that would prevent the execution of people who have intellectual disabilities. The measure, which lowers the burden of proof for intellectual disability claims and introduces a pretrial hearing on whether a defendant is intellectually disabled, now moves to the Senate for consideration. And a GOP-sponsored bill in Oklahoma would pause all pending executions and prevent new execution dates from being scheduled.

However, another bill in Oklahoma would make people living illegally in the U.S. who are convicted of first-degree murder eligible for the death penalty. And some states, including Iowa and New Mexico, are considering bills that would expand capital punishment by making the murder of a police officer eligible for the death penalty. Both states have abolished capital punishment, but there have been multiple attempts over the years to reinstate it for specific crimes…. Florida also enacted a law earlier this year mandating the automatic imposition of capital punishment for people living illegally in the U.S. convicted of capital crimes, including first-degree murder and child rape….

Meanwhile, other states are focusing on execution methods. Lawmakers in Idaho approved a bill that could make it the first state to use the firing squad as its primary execution method. Arizona lawmakers are considering a bill to allow execution by firing squad, and legislators in Arkansas, Nebraska and Ohio are weighing bills that would add nitrogen gas hypoxia as an execution method.