U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration moved to expand the Trump federal death penalty policy by allowing firing squads and other execution methods for federal prisoners, according to Justice Department guidance issued in Washington, D.C., on April 24, 2026.
The U.S. Department of Justice said it had readopted the lethal injection protocol used during President Donald Trump’s first administration and expanded approved execution methods to include firing squads.
The policy follows Trump’s January 20, 2025, executive order directing the attorney general to pursue federal death sentences and reverse Biden-era limits on capital punishment.
The Justice Department also moved to streamline internal procedures for death penalty cases, saying the changes would support victims’ families and enforce lawfully imposed capital sentences.
The Associated Press reported that only three people remained on federal death row after former President Joe Biden commuted 37 federal death sentences to life imprisonment in December 2024.
Trump’s first administration carried out 13 federal executions in 2020 and early 2021 after a 17-year pause, using pentobarbital in lethal injections.
