Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty

Ohio

What Conservatives in Ohio Are Saying

The death penalty has been in a death spiral decline across our nation for two decades. Only 25 states still have active death penalty systems, and of those, 10 have not carried out an execution in a decade or more. But until two years ago, Ohio was among the few states still carrying out executions. It is a traditionally high usage states and contains one of the largest death row populations in our nation. It’s also a very red state, with Republicans controlling the Governor’s office and both chambers of the legislature.

The tide is turning quickly in the Buckeye State, though. In 2018, Republican Governor Mike DeWine halted executions based on a court finding that the state’s method was unconstitutional. He has refused to allow any executions to move forward since then. Shortly thereafter, Republican heavyweight and Speaker of the House, Larry Householder, publicly announced his concerns for the death penalty and acknowledged the many flaws in the system.

In recent months, the momentum to repeal the death penalty in the state has taken off. Multiple Republican lawmakers have joined the cries for repeal, over three dozen prominent conservatives in the state have signed our statement of support, and we launched our official CCATDP Ohio Chapter in February of 2020. Keep your eyes on Ohio, this is the state to watch.

"We've been coming into the state over the past year, we've been meeting with conservatives both at the legislature and within the grassroots, and we're finding that there are a lot of conservatives who are already there with us on this issue - they're struggling with it, they recognize it doesn't work, they're happy to have an organization that they can coalesce around and start educating others about this broken, failed policy."

– Hannah Cox, National Manager, Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty

"This is one of the very few political issues in our time where you see movement toward consensus, and most of that movement is coming from elected Republicans and their conservative voters. I care about this issue for three reasons. First conservatives do care about criminal justice reform that is implemented and executed in an efficient way - that is certainly not the case with the capital punishment. We believe in conserving and protecting taxpayer dollars, this is one of the biggest wastes that could go to other priorities that we hold dear. And the third is I'm a christian, I believe in the sanctity of human life. One wrongful death at the hands of the government is unthinkable, and it has to stop."

– Josh Culling

"Conservatives are very distrustful of big government, and to give government the power over life and death is rather concerning to a lot of us. We believe that the sanctity of life should be protected more than anything else, and when you give the government the power over life we've given them the ultimate power and we've soon throughout history where giving the government that much power can have devastating effects."

– Laura Lanese, OH House of Representatives

"In the summer of 1998, I was selected as a juror in a double homicide trial out of Hamilton County. A trial in which I ultimately voted for the death penalty. 20 years later I wrote a letter to Governor Kasich asking him to use his clemency power to commute this sentence. My experience left me with the feeling that even if a defendant deserves death, we're just really bad at administering the system."

– Ross Geiger

"I am here today because I got a phone call on June 21st, 2017 that changed me forever. It was a friend of mine informing me that my dad had been murdered. Every step of this process has a brutal - emotional and psychological -impact on family members of victims. I'm forced to relive everything over and over again while waiting on closure. Does this sound like justice? The death penalty needs to stop now."

– Jonathan Mann

"You look at this list we've released today, look at the significant former (Republican) officeholders are - governor, attorney general, congressman - and then look at the activists, the people I've worked with to twenty years to elect presidents, governors, congressmen, and everybody in between - that list that was released today, I'll go to war with that list any day because all we do, and have done, is win."

– Mike Hartley

 

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About Us

Questioning a system marked by inefficiency, inequity, and inaccuracy.

Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty is a network of political and social conservatives who question the alignment of capital punishment with conservative principles and values.

We are a project of Equal Justice USA, a national organization working to end the death penalty in the United States.

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