June 2025: An Execution-Heavy Month

In the span of three weeks this June, six men were executed by five states:

June 10 – Anthony Wainwright (Florida)
June 10 – Gregory Hunt (Alabama)
June 12 – John Hanson (Oklahoma)
June 14 – Stephen Stanko (South Carolina)
June 24 – Thomas Gudinas (Florida)
June 25 – Richard Jordan (Mississippi)

This pace defies years-long trends demonstrating progressive disfavor with the death penalty across the country.

Notably, the execution of Thomas Gudinas marked the seventh one carried out by the state of Florida this year (as opposed to just one execution last year), while Stephen Stanko’s marked South Carolina’s second execution after a 14-year execution hiatus in the state. Mississippi also carried out Richard Jordan’s execution after a short pause of three years.

Looking back at this month, advocates for death penalty abolition may begin to wonder: how can we have hope in this period of rapid executions? Are things moving backward?

On June 18, Catholic Mobilizing Network (CMN) hosted a webinar to address these exact questions. The webinar, titled “What’s Really Happening with the Death Penalty in 2025?”, generated widespread engagement and featured three experts on the death penalty: Robert Dunham, the founder and director of the Death Penalty Policy Project; Stefanie Faucher, the Deputy Director of the 8th Amendment Project; and Demetrius Minor, Executive Director for Conservatives Concerned.

“What we need to understand is that there’s this long-term trend away from capital punishment in the United States,” said Dunham during the discussion. “The number of new death sentences this year is close to historic lows.”

Faucher wholeheartedly agreed saying, “this is the death penalty’s ‘last stand’.” The individuals we are seeing receive death sentences now, she noted, are often the results of years-long backlogs following the COVID-19 pandemic. As advocates, it’s important to remember that while the executions are carried out today, they are vestiges of decades past.

Minor noted that the death penalty is becoming less favorable even in the eyes of staunch conservatives. “The capital punishment is the one punishment that is irreversible … [Conservatives] tend to see [it] as a dangerous overreach.”

And across the board, there was a hopeful outlook on the next generation of leadership — the youngest crowd of death penalty abolition advocates that are slowly becoming louder.

It is no coincidence that this line of thinking came about only a few days after Pope Leo XIV virtually addressed the crowd at White Sox Stadium in his hometown of Chicago, Illinois where a celebration in honor of his inauguration was hosted.

“To — once again — the young people who are gathered here, I’d like to say that you are the promise of hope for so many of us.”

Despite an unusually busy month of executions, hope continues to resound throughout the death penalty abolition movement.

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