'Is the death penalty racist? Of course it is.'

‘Of course the death penalty is racist. And it would be wrong even if it weren’t.’

Los Angeles Times editorial board

Civil rights groups have asked the California Supreme Court to invalidate the death penalty in the state, arguing it’s racist, says the Los Angeles Times editorial board. They’re right. A study found “Black defendants were 4.6 to 8.7 times more likely to be sentenced to death than other defendants,” and the disparity was larger when the victim was white or Asian. But the death penalty “would still be wrong” if biases were eliminated. It gives the government “too much power.”

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Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) has been “dangling an axe over House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) for weeks” for passing Ukraine aid, says Joe Perticone. But it’s apparent even to the right-wing provocateur herself that she “overplayed her hand.” Greene was hoping to boost her standing by ousting Johnson the way Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) got rid of Kevin McCarthy last year. But her antics have “further alienated herself from her colleagues” and diminished her influence.

The Biden administration is trying to talk International Criminal Court prosecutors out of charging Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for obstructing aid to Palestinians, but Washington’s arguments “are weak,” says Kenneth Roth. It insists the ICC lacks jurisdiction, but the governments that created the court two decades ago have already “overruled” that claim. “As it did for the alleged Russian war crimes in Ukraine, the Biden administration should stand aside and let the ICC process run its course.”

Republican state lawmakers are making “police more impervious to any meaningful oversight,” says John Pfaff. Florida and Tennessee have “gutted” independent oversight boards, packing them with current and former officers. Elevating “police to the baronial class” threatens efforts to “make our criminal legal system more racially just.” It also poses a “much bigger, existential threat” ahead of a presidential election in which “one candidate who has extraordinary police and first-responder support is unlikely” to concede if he loses.

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