California Death-Penalty Power Meets Newsom Clemency Bid

California Gov. Gavin Newsom moved Thursday to offer clemency to all 548 people sentenced to death in state prisons, challenging the punishment while leaving its machinery in place. The death penalty remains legal in California, and prosecutors can continue seeking death sentences. The governor’s move would commute sentences, not abolish capital punishment.

A governor’s power, with limits

Newsom can commute about 40% of the sentences himself under the state Constitution. Cases involving prisoners with a prior felony conviction or additional crimes while awaiting execution require approval from the California Supreme Court. The court rejected 10 commutations issued by Gov. Jerry Brown in his last full month in office; all involved people convicted of multiple felonies, and the court didn’t explain its decision.

California voters rejected death-penalty abolition measures in 2012 and 2016. Those votes left the punishment on the books, while Newsom’s clemency move works through the executive power available to him. It doesn’t prevent prosecutors from seeking death sentences in future cases.

Newsom imposed a moratorium on executions in 2019, saying capital punishment was discriminatory and unjust. His office said 45 people would be subject to execution now without the moratorium. California hasn’t executed a prisoner since 2006, and the death chamber at San Quentin State Prison, now San Quentin Rehabilitation Center, was dismantled at Newsom’s direction after the pause. Gov.-elect Xavier Becerra has said he would continue it.

The people caught in the machinery

Sacramento County Sheriff Jim Cooper urged Newsom to reconsider, recalling Luis Bracamontes laughing in court while the families of Sacramento County Sheriff's Deputy Danny Oliver and Placer County Sheriff's Detective Michael Davis Jr. watched. Bracamontes was sentenced to death for killing Oliver and Davis in 2014.

“Deputy Danny Oliver and Detective Michael Davis Jr. should be alive today, enjoying long and healthy lives with their families. Instead, the man who murdered them has now escaped his sentence,” Cooper said.

Riverside County District Attorney Michael Hestrin said the decision showed “a profound disregard for the victims, their families, and the prosecutors who dedicated themselves to seeking justice on their behalf.” Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Nathan Hochman said his office would keep evaluating death-eligible cases “with the rigor, care and restraint these decisions demand.” The prosecutors’ offices retain the ability to pursue death sentences; the clemency decision concerns the sentences of people already condemned.

Newsom cited Bryan Stevenson, founder of Equal Justice Initiative, who said a person is better off being rich and guilty than poor and innocent. Newsom said the death penalty wasn’t applied equally. The article describes no community-led or mutual-aid response to the decision; the available action here is concentrated in the governor’s office, the courts, prosecutors and voters.

The political calculation

A Pew Research Center poll conducted in August found about two-thirds of voters nationally favored the death penalty for people convicted of murder. Political analysts said commutations could strengthen Newsom’s standing with progressive voters if he seeks the presidency in 2028, while Republicans could portray him as soft on crime and out of touch, potentially alienating moderate voters.

Newsom discussed the decision in a Friday interview and said he expected political consequences. “I'm not an idiot. The ads write themselves,” he said. He also said he would have felt ashamed if he hadn’t acted, and described his motivation as standing up for ideals and striking out against injustice. “My job's leadership, not stewardship. It's not management. It's to lead. I'm here to change polls, change minds,” he said.

Gar Culbert, chair of the political science department at Cal State Los Angeles, said appealing to the Democratic base could benefit Newsom, but he didn’t expect the death penalty to become a substantial general-election issue if Newsom became the Democratic nominee. “It's possible he's not being strategic,” Culbert said. “Maybe he doesn't have to be strategic because he just might think it's the right thing to do.” Daniel Zingale, a former senior adviser in Newsom's governor's office at the start of his first term, said Newsom wasn’t interested in the polls during the decision-making process and viewed the issue as one that couldn’t be leveraged politically.