A federal death row inmate in Indiana fears that Donald Trump being re-elected would mean an immediate resumption in executions, after the Republican presided over a record 13 executions in his final seven months of office.
“It seems like they’re prepping,” Billie Allen, 46, told the Daily Mail, after a delegation of officials visited the Terre Haute prison, home to the federal execution chamber. “Some of the guys are saying it’s getting real. They’re getting ready and finding out if the equipment’s still working.”
Allen, who has been on death row since 1998 for a St. Louis murder and bank robbery, maintains his innocence.
“Trump has said he plans to finish what he started,” he toldThe Guardian. “I’m terrified that I will be executed– not just because I’m going to die, but because I’m going to die for something I didn’t do ... I can only hope that as someone who is innocent he would do the right thing.”
Allen, who is Black, insists his case had a number of flaws, including a nearly all-white jury that didn’t match community demographics, alibi evidence that was ignored, and DNA testing of materials in a getaway car that excluded both him and the murder victim.
Organizations like Amnesty International have also called for Allen’s release.
Joe Biden was the first presidential candidate to openly oppose capital punishment, citing capital punishment’s well-document racial bias and numerous mistaken sentences.
His administration put federal executions on hold, and his Justice Department has reviewed its stance on executions, but the DOJ continues to pursue new death sentences in high-profile cases. And Biden hasn’t commutted any of the existing death sentences in federal prison, disappointing civil rights advocates.
Those activists worry a second Trump term will mean more executions.
Project 2025, the conservative thinktank blueprint for a second Trump administration, has called for the Republican to “do everything possible” to execute the remaining 40 people on federal death row, arguing the White House should push for these killings “until Congress says otherwise through legislation.”
