SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Thursday that he is commuting all 548 death sentences in California to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, the largest mass commutation of death sentences in modern American history.
In a three-page open letter released Nov. 5, Newsom said his decision reflects his longstanding opposition to capital punishment and concerns about wrongful convictions, racial disparities and the fairness of the justice system.
“State-sanctioned killing is incompatible with California’s values, undermines the foundations of our legal system and diminishes each of us,” Newsom wrote.
California has not executed anyone since 2006, and Newsom imposed a moratorium on executions in 2019. Unlike that temporary suspension, commutations would permanently replace death sentences with life without parole.
The decision affects approximately one-fourth of the nation’s death sentences and surpasses the previous modern record of 167 death sentences commuted by Illinois Gov. George Ryan in 2003.
The action faces a constitutional hurdle. California’s Supreme Court must approve commutations involving individuals convicted of multiple felonies, a requirement affecting more than half the cases. Former Sacramento County District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert has said she intends to challenge the blanket commutations in court.
The American Civil Liberties Union welcomed the announcement, citing longstanding concerns about racial discrimination and wrongful convictions in capital cases.
“Today, Gov. Newsom made history by announcing his intention to commute every death sentence in California and clear the largest death row in the nation,” said ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero.
Romero said the decision addresses a system in which the risk of receiving a death sentence has been influenced by race, geography and politics.
Cristine Soto DeBerry, executive director of Prosecutors Alliance Action, also praised the decision, arguing that capital punishment has failed to improve public safety while consuming billions in public resources.
“California’s death penalty system is inhumane, ineffective, and enormously wasteful,” DeBerry said. “We know innocent people have been sentenced to death.”
DeBerry said California has spent $6 billion on its death penalty system since 1978, money she argued could instead support victims, mental health services and rehabilitation programs.
Opposition has come from prosecutors and victims’ families who argue that the commutations disregard jury verdicts and reopen painful experiences for survivors.
Schubert, who leads the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, has argued that the governor must consider clemency individually rather than through a blanket action.
Newsom acknowledged the concerns of victims’ families but maintained that executions cannot be justified.
“These offenders will die in prison but not by our hand,” he wrote.
The governor’s action does not repeal California’s death penalty statute or prevent prosecutors from seeking death sentences in future cases.
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