Read a PDF of our statement here.

On October 5, 2026, it was announced that President Trump greenlit the first U.S. military execution by firing squad since 1945.

Under the first Trump administration, 13 federal executions were carried out. This execution, if carried out, would be the first firing squad execution carried out by the U.S. military since World War II.

In response, the Legal Defense Fund (LDF) made the following statement

"Just last week, the state of Tennessee failed in a gut-wrenching attempt to execute Christa Pike by lethal injection for a crime committed when she was 18 years old. What happened to her serves as a reminder for people across the globe that the death penalty is an absolute abomination. Against all odds, she survived two doses of lethal injection drugs.

"The Trump administration's announcement to pursue a military execution by a manner not used in the military since 1945 demonstrates the federal government's zeal for brutality at any cost.

"Recent incidents of horrendous suffering in botched executions were not enough to deter President Trump from greenlighting this barbaric execution. Neither were decades of history outlining the death penalty's many horrors or the racism undergirding its administration.

"There is no crime that the death penalty will undo. We roundly condemn the administration's pursuit of this execution."

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Founded in 1940, the Legal Defense Fund (LDF) is the nation's first civil rights legal organization. LDF has been completely separate from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) since 1957, though it was founded under the leadership of Thurgood Marshall while he was at the NAACP. LDF's Thurgood Marshall Institute (TMI) is a division of LDF that undertakes innovative research and houses LDF's archive. In all media attributions, please refer to us as the Legal Defense Fund or LDF (do not include NAACP) and refer to the Institute as LDF's Thurgood Marshall Institute or TMI.