Newsom commutes death sentences for every person on California’s death row. Governor Gavin Newsom announced on 5 November that he will commute all 548 death sentences in the state to life in prison without the possibility of parole, a move the Death Penalty Information Center calls the largest mass commutation in American history.
The decision does not free anyone. When Newsom commutes death sentences in this way, it does not erase a conviction, and it does not mean the men and women now on death row will walk out of prison. What it does is take execution off the table for all of them at once, in a state that has not carried out an execution in about 20 years.
Newsom framed the move as a moral choice and a practical one. California’s death penalty, he said, has failed on its own terms: it costs far more than life imprisonment, it takes decades to resolve, and it has fallen hardest on defendants who could not afford strong legal help. “The death penalty in California is, by any measure, broken, discriminatory and ineffective,” Newsom said.
Newsom commutes death sentences: what the order actually does
The commutations change the sentence, not the verdict. Each of the 548 people will serve life in prison without parole instead of facing execution. They will stay in prison, and they will not get a new trial because of this order. For families of victims, that distinction matters: the punishment remains severe, but the state will no longer kill the person who committed the crime. That is the core of the decision when Newsom commutes death sentences in one order rather than case by case.
There is one catch, and it is a big one. Under California law, the governor cannot commute the sentence of anyone convicted of more than one felony on his own. That group covers 382 of the 548 cases, so those commutations still need approval from the California Supreme Court. Newsom has asked the court to approve them, but until it does, those 382 sentences are promised, not yet final.
Why Newsom says he acted now
Newsom commutes death sentences now because, in his view, the system has already stopped working. In 2019, in his first months as governor, he signed a moratorium that stopped executions in California. He also closed the death chamber at San Quentin and moved people on death row into the general prison population. Thursday’s announcement was the next step in that same direction, and he presented it as finishing a job he started seven years ago.
His advisers also point to the numbers. California’s death row is the largest in the country, and the system around it has slowed to a crawl. Only five new death sentences were handed down in the state last year, down from 42 in 1999. The state has executed 13 people since the death penalty was restored in 1976, and none in roughly two decades. In practice, a death sentence in California has meant decades on death row, followed by death from natural causes.
Jess Nichol, a lawyer who represents people on death row, welcomed the move. “For my client, and for the more than 500 people still on death row, these commutations are a critical step toward fairness, healing and hope for us all,” she said. Supporters argue that the money saved, and the years of court time freed up, can go to solving cold cases and helping victims’ families instead.
A death row that had already stopped moving
California voters have twice rejected ballot measures to abolish the death penalty, in 2012 and 2016, and that history is part of why the decision that Newsom commutes death sentences is so striking. He is not asking voters to change their minds. He is using the governor’s clemency power, which the state constitution gives him, to act where the ballot box did not.
The racial gap in the system is one of the reasons his supporters cite most often. As of April, 68 percent of the people on California’s death row were people of colour. Research by the Death Penalty Information Center has found similar gaps across the country, with Black defendants far more likely to be sentenced to death when the victim is white. Since 1973, more than 200 people sentenced to death in the United States have later been exonerated, according to the same centre.
What supporters and critics are saying
Not everyone sees it the same way. Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman called the announcement largely symbolic, given the moratorium already in place. “The Governor’s announcement today means nothing more than putting a sticker over the same moratorium he implemented almost eight years ago,” Hochman said.
Other critics have been sharper, pointing to the names on death row. They include Randy Kraft, convicted of killing 16 men, and Charles Ng, convicted in a series of murders in the 1980s. Richard Allen Davis, who murdered 12-year-old Polly Klaas in 1993, is also on the row. For the families in those cases, the death sentence was the punishment a jury chose, and they say the governor should not be the one to set it aside. Newsom’s team answers that the commutations do not question the guilt of the people involved. The argument is about the punishment, not the crime.
What happens next
The next step belongs to the California Supreme Court. It must decide whether to approve the 382 commutations that need its sign-off, and that decision will settle how quickly Newsom commutes death sentences in full. There is no fixed timetable for that, and the court could approve them in batches, ask for more information, or, in theory, refuse some of them. Until then, those cases sit in a kind of legal limbo: promised by the governor, but not yet final.
Newsom’s move also lands in a country where the death penalty is moving in different directions at once. Tennessee had a failed execution attempt in late September, while North Carolina, Oregon and Colorado have all taken steps to limit or end the practice in recent years. In March, Alabama’s governor commuted a death sentence, but for one person, not hundreds. California’s move is different in scale, and it cuts the national death-row total by nearly 30 percent.
Sources and Resources
Read the original reporting behind this story: CNN: Newsom commutes sentences of all California death row prisoners. For background on the scale of the move and on exonerations, see the Death Penalty Information Center. More US coverage is on the World Reach Daily homepage.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many death sentences did Newsom commute?
Newsom commutes death sentences for all 548 people on California’s death row. Their sentences become life in prison without the possibility of parole, if the commutations are completed.
Does this mean anyone on death row will be released?
No. Life without parole means the person stays in prison for the rest of their life. The commutation changes the punishment, not the conviction.
Why do 382 cases still need court approval?
California law says the governor needs the Supreme Court’s approval to commute a sentence when the person was convicted of more than one felony. That covers 382 of the 548 cases where Newsom commutes death sentences.
Has California executed anyone recently?
No. The state has not carried out an execution in about 20 years, and it has executed only 13 people since the death penalty was restored in 1976.
Why is this called the largest mass commutation in US history?
Because of the number. No governor has commuted 548 death sentences at once before, and the move cuts the total number of people on death row across the United States by nearly 30 percent.
Conclusion
Newsom commutes death sentences in the biggest single use of clemency in the history of the American death penalty, and it changes California’s system in one stroke. The court still has to approve most of the cases, and the families of victims will keep arguing that a jury’s sentence should stand. But for now, the largest death row in the country has a different future: no executions, and life in prison instead.