Lethal injection has long been the prevailing method for carrying out the death penalty in the U.S.
asserted
injection → prevail → U.S.
supply-chain issues and a series of high-profile botched executions are increasingly causing officials around the country to weigh alternative options—including one that, until recently, had been all but entirely left in the past.
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that → botch → past
Following the failed execution of Christa Pike in Tennessee last week—the second botched execution in the state this year using lethal injection—several Tennessee lawmakers have publicly called for the state to turn to other methods.
asserted
state → follow → methods
“If we’re having this much trouble with this particular means of execution, we need to take it off the table and go to something that’s far more reliable and predictable,” Tennessee Senate Majority Leader Jack Johnson said while speaking on a local radio show on Monday.
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Johnson → have → Monday
Republican Rep. Tim Burchett, who represents Tennessee's second congressional district in the House, similarly told local station WVLT last Friday that Tennessee should abandon lethal injection in favor of other methods that have “very little room for mistakes.”
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that → represent → mistakes
Tennessee House Speaker Cameron Sexton told The Associated Press in an interview published on Monday that “I don’t think there’s any method that’s off the table at this point.”
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that → tell → point
Among the potential alternatives named by both Johnson and Burchett was execution by firing squad.
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execution → name → squad
The method has been used exceedingly rarely in the U.S.: between 1976 and 2024, just three people were put to death by firing squad in the country, all of them in Utah.
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people → use → Utah
But the Tennessee lawmakers aren’t the only ones who have recently suggested reviving the practice—and some state officials and President Donald Trump have already made moves to do just that.
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officials → suggest → that
Trump on Monday approved the U.S. Army’s first execution of a soldier via firing squad since World War II, greenlighting the use of the method to put to death Nidal Hasan, a former U.S. Army major and psychiatrist who was convicted of killing 13 people in a mass shooting at Fort Hood in Texas in 2009, following a recommendation by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
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who → approve → Hegseth
Hasan’s execution is scheduled to take place on Dec. 3 at Fort Hood and, Hegseth has announced, to be livestreamed.
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Hegseth → schedule → Hood
The approval comes months after Trump authorized the use of firing squads in federal executions in April.
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Trump → come → April
Both South Carolina and Idaho have also taken steps in recent months to either enable the use of firing squad executions or to carry them out.
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Carolina → take → them
Last year, in the wake of a failed 2024 execution attempt using lethal injection in the state, South Carolina put three people to death by firing squad—doubling the number of such executions that had been carried out in the entire U.S. over the prior half-century.
Idaho, meanwhile, enacted a law earlier this year that established the firing squad as the state’s primary method for carrying out the death penalty.
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that → fail → penalty
That move, too, followed a high-profile botched execution via lethal injection in the state in 2024.
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move → follow → 2024
How does a firing squad execution work?
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execution → work → ?
The specific procedure for execution by firing squad varies across different states, but the general method remains the same, according to Austin Sarat, a professor of law and political science at Amherst College and the author of Gruesome Spectacles: Botched Executions and America’s Death Penalty,.
uncertain
method → vary → Spectacles
He explains that traditionally, a person is strapped to a chair, a hood is placed over their head and a target is put on their heart, to highlight where the shooters should aim.
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shooters → explain → heart
Then, between three and five people with high-powered rifles will fire at the target.
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people → power → target
In some states, one rifle will be loaded with a blank bullet, so that the shooters do not know who fired the fatal shots.
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who → load → shots
“When the signal is given, they shoot into the heart of the condemned,” Sarat says.
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Sarat → give → condemned
Which states allow execution by firing squad?
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states → allow → squad
Firing squad executions are currently permitted in just five states: Idaho, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Utah.
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executions → permit → states
Idaho, under its recently enacted law, is the only state that uses the firing squad as its default method.
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that → enact → method
The other states have designated execution by firing squad to be used as a fallback method if they are unable to carry out the death penalty by lethal injection, or as one of several methods that can be chosen by either corrections officials or inmates themselves to perform an execution.
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that → designate → execution
Utah in 2015 designated the firing squad as the alternative method to turn to if the state cannot, for instance, obtain the necessary drugs to perform an execution by lethal injection.
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state → designate → injection
Oklahoma permitted firing squads in 2011 as a method of last resort.
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Oklahoma → permit → resort
Mississippi in 2022 gave discretion to corrections officials to choose among four methods, including the firing squad.
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Mississippi → give → squad
And in South Carolina, the firing squad has since 2021 been one of multiple methods that death row inmates can choose for their means of execution, along with electrocution and lethal injection.
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inmates → choose → electrocution
If they do not choose a method, electrocution is used.
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electrocution → choose → method
Robin Maher, the executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, a non-profit organization that provides analysis and research on capital punishment, tells TIME that at least one inmate appears to have opted for the firing squad in the state last year due to a lack of information provided regarding what other forms of capital punishment entail.
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forms → provide → punishment
“Prisoners who asked for information about the other two methods of execution, namely the electric chair and lethal injection, were not given complete answers to understand how those methods would be used, and so at least in one of those cases, the prisoners felt like the firing squad was the only method of execution they knew enough about to choose,” Maher says.
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Maher → ask → execution
Lethal injection issues prompt a search for solutions
Oklahoma became the first state to authorize lethal injection in 1977, as it sought more humane methods for capital punishment.
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it → prompt → punishment
From the late 1970s on, lethal injection was performed in Oklahoma and, later, other states using a three-drug protocol, explains Richard Levy, an anesthesiologist at Columbia University: one drug, sodium thiopental, to induce unconsciousness; a second paralytic drug to stop breathing; and potassium chloride to stop the heart from beating.
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Levy → perform → heart
In 2011, the company which manufactured sodium thiopental, Hospira, stopped manufacturing the drug, leaving states to revise their protocols for lethal injection.
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which → manufacture → injection
“Each state basically has adopted some variation on the theme,” Levy says in reference to the original three-drug protocol.
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Levy → adopt → protocol
He explains that the majority of states have since “gone to a single-drug approach,” a method he describes as “flawed and problematic.”
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he → explain → approach
Many states use a single dose of pentobarbital, which depresses the central nervous system.
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which → use → system
Levy explains that compared to thiopentol, pentobarbital doesn’t as effectively induce unconsciousness, “and probably doesn't reliably stop one from breathing.”
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pentobarbital → explain → one
Pike was given two doses of pentobarbital in her failed execution attempt before she was hospitalized; she complained that her arms were burning as the pentobarbital was administered, after several needles were unsuccessfully used to access a vein.
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needles → give → vein
…and 35 more, not listed.
The Aporia
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