In a renewed push for federal capital punishment, President Donald Trump announced on August 25, 2025, plans to seek the death penalty for suspected murderers in Washington, DC, framing it as a “preventative” measure amid what he described as escalating lawlessness. The remarks, delivered during a cabinet meeting at the White House, come as hundreds of National Guard troops and federal officers have been deployed to the capital.
Trump’s proposal marks a sharp departure from the previous administration’s moratorium on federal executions and echoes his earlier tenure, during which 13 federal inmates were executed in the final months of his first term—more than any president in over a century.
The legal path to implementing capital punishment in DC remains fraught. The city repealed its death penalty in 1981, and a 2002 referendum reaffirmed public opposition.
While federal matters unfold, click through the gallery to reveal the countries around the world that still enforce the death penalty.