Gov. DeWine: ‘Ohio should abolish the death penalty’

COLUMBUS (WXIX) - Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine (R), a longtime proponent of capital punishment, says he no longer believes in the death penalty.

Less than a year until his gubernatorial term is up, Gov. DeWine announced his stance on a long-debated topic: The death penalty, an issue he says he has had time to “wrestle with” over the last 50 years.

“I believe Ohio should abolish the death penalty. The legislature could take this action, and I think they should take this action,” he said during a press conference on Tuesday.

When he was a State Senator, DeWine cosponsored Senate Bill 1, an act reinstating Ohio’s death penalty after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the state’s initial statute. It was passed and signed by Gov. James Rhodes in 1981.

Throughout his political career, he continued his support for Ohio’s death penalty law, especially when he was elected into Congress and later as Ohio Attorney General.

“When I voted for the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1981, I believed that in some cases capital punishment could serve as a deterrent to keep some people from killing. For me, it was the moral justification for having the death penalty,” DeWine said.

Certainty and swiftness, he says, are the two most important things when judging if capital punishment is effective. How likely is it, and how much time will it take?

Based on state death row data, he does not believe capital punishment is an effective deterrent.

“It is today impossible to make the case that the death penalty is a deterrent to murder,” DeWine said. “I do not believe that argument today can be successfully made.”

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DeWine says the best way to prevent violence is to lock up convicted violent offenders and murderers, and to keep them locked up.

“Like most things in life, when you wrestle with difficult issues (like capital punishment), it’s a process … Once you see all those facts, I’m persuaded that it’s not a deterrent,” he continued.

The governor’s call to end the death penalty has received support from both sides of the political aisle.

Conservatives Concerned, a Republican-aligned organization, says they join DeWine in trying to abolish Ohio’s capital punishment statute.

“His position is in step with many Republican state office holders across the country who argue that the death penalty conflicts with conservative values of protecting innocent people, honoring life, and being fiscally responsible,” says executive director Demetrius Minor. “We commend Governor DeWine for his moral courage and encourage Ohio leaders to embrace alternatives to the death penalty that promote justice, public safety, and accountability.”

Ignite Peace, a Cincinnati-based nonprofit known for supporting immigrant and refugee communities and combatting violence, also applauds DeWine’s call to action.

The organization says they have been working for more than 40 years to end the death penalty in Ohio and across the nation.

“A justice system that compounds violence rather than healing it does not protect any of us. We are grateful our governor cares enough to interrupt these cycles of violence, and join him in calling on our state legislators to act. Now is the time to end the death penalty once and for all,” executive director Shannon Hughes partially wrote in a statement. “Through decades of advocacy, our relationships with exonerees, murder victims’ family members, and those with family members on death row have taught us that we all deserve better than this cruel system.”

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Ohio Senators Nickie Antonio (D-23) and Stephen Huffman (R-5) are cosponsoring Senate Bill 134 to end the death penalty in the Buckeye state. It is currently sitting in the Senate’s Judiciary Committee.

If the legislature does not pass a bill to abolish the death penalty, the governor says the decisions should be left up to Ohio voters.

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