SACRAMENTO, Calif. — A coalition of 46 international human rights and abolitionist organizations is urging California Gov. Gavin Newsom to use the final months of his administration to commute every death sentence in the state, arguing that the move would eliminate the threat of execution for more than 550 people and send a powerful global message in support of ending capital punishment. The organizations say California, which holds more than one-quarter of the nation’s death row population, presents a historic opportunity to reshape the future of the death penalty in the United States.
The coalition, representing members of the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty from across the globe, issued an open letter Thursday calling on Newsom to use his remaining months in office to permanently remove the threat of execution for the more than 550 people currently under sentence of death in California. The organizations argued that such an action would significantly alter the landscape of capital punishment in the United States while generating renewed momentum for abolition efforts worldwide.
The letter praised Newsom’s longstanding opposition to capital punishment, including his 2019 executive order establishing a moratorium on executions in California, and urged him to take what it described as an “unmissable opportunity to leave an enduring mark on the death penalty.” The coalition noted that California houses more than 25% of the people sentenced to death in the United States, making any action by the governor nationally significant.
“We, the undersigned 46 organizations, write to you today to ask you for your immediate action to end the threat of execution for more than 550 people currently living under sentence of death in California,” the organizations wrote.
They added that Newsom’s decision to commute all death sentences “would not only significantly change the face of the death penalty in the USA; it would also send a strong signal internationally and help us advance the cause of abolition globally.”
The coalition represents organizations from multiple continents, including Amnesty International, Parliamentarians for Global Action, the Cornell Center on the Death Penalty Worldwide, the Kenya Human Rights Commission, Human Rights Dallas, the Anti-Death Penalty Asia Network and the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty. According to the letter, the organizations include death row exonerees, family members of people sentenced to death, crime victims’ families, nongovernmental organizations, bar associations, local governments and labor organizations working together to end capital punishment.
The organizations emphasized that their opposition to the death penalty is rooted in human rights principles and rejected claims that executions serve as a uniquely effective deterrent to crime.
“We stand united in our unconditional opposition to the death penalty as a violation of human rights and reject in full misinformed portrayals of the death penalty as a uniquely effective deterrent to crime, detracting resources from measures that would address the root causes and make our society safer,” the letter states.
The coalition also expressed concern about what it described as increasing use of punitive rhetoric surrounding public safety.
“We are alarmed by the rise of dehumanizing narratives on public safety that often see the death penalty exploited by authorities as a tool of fear and control, a weapon in the authoritarian playbook to entrench power,” the organizations wrote.
Amnesty International USA Executive Director Nadia Daar said Newsom has already demonstrated leadership through his moratorium on executions but argued that commuting all death sentences would have an even broader impact.
“Governor Newsom has already demonstrated leadership by establishing a moratorium on executions in California,” Daar said after meeting with the governor’s office earlier in the week.
“Commuting all death sentences is the right thing to do, and its impact would not just be for those hundreds of individuals living with the constant threat of this inhuman punishment — it would be a bold move toward ending the death penalty more broadly.”
Daar added, “In his last months in office, Governor Newsom could transform California from a state with the nation’s largest death row into a leader in the movement to end this despicable practice.”
The coalition highlighted Newsom’s previous actions on capital punishment, noting that shortly after taking office in 2019 he imposed a moratorium on executions while describing California’s death penalty system as “unfair, unjust, wasteful, protracted and [which] does not make our state safer.” The organizations also cited his acknowledgment of racial discrimination within California’s criminal justice system and his support for legislative changes expanding safeguards in death penalty cases.
“From afar, we have followed closely the steps that you have taken on the death penalty,” the letter states. “From the moratorium on all executions that you established in 2019, shortly after taking office, when you described California’s death penalty system as ‘unfair, unjust, wasteful, protracted and [which] does not make our state safer,’ and your ultimate goal as ending it; to your powerful acknowledgment before the Supreme Court of California of the discrimination that is pervasive in the state criminal justice system; to your support for legislative amendments to expand safeguards in death penalty cases.”
The organizations framed the governor’s remaining time in office as a unique opportunity to influence both domestic and international efforts to eliminate capital punishment.
“Your last months in office as the Governor of California offer you an unmissable opportunity to leave an enduring mark on the death penalty in the USA and internationally, by acting to commute all death sentences in the US state that holds close to one third of the national total,” the coalition wrote.
The letter also drew on historical voices associated with justice and abolition, quoting former French Justice Minister Robert Badinter, who led France’s abolition of the death penalty in 1981.
“The choice that is lying in front of your consciences is thus clear: either our society refuses a justice that kills and accepts, in the name of its fundamental values … to take on the lives of those … that horrify it, and that is the choice of abolition; or this society believes, in spite of the experience of centuries, it can make crime disappear with the criminal, and that’s elimination,” Badinter said, according to the letter.
The coalition said King’s words continue to serve as a guiding principle for the global movement to abolish capital punishment, arguing that the death penalty perpetuates cycles of violence rather than justice.
“These words continue to guide us, as they call on us to resist the cycle of violence and retribution that the death penalty epitomizes,” the organizations wrote. “Despite the setbacks and alarming global rises in executions that we have been confronted with, we are more hopeful than ever that we are on an unstoppable journey toward global abolition. We ask for your leadership to initiate the process to commute all death sentences in California and add another brick in our collective journey to build a world free of ‘justice’ that kills.”
Under California law, Newsom has the authority to directly grant clemency to roughly 40% of the people currently on the state’s death row. For the remaining cases, he may request that the California Supreme Court recommend commutations. Amnesty International is supporting the Clemency California campaign, which is urging the governor to act before leaving office in January 2027.
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