Republican Governor of Ohio Mike DeWine has announced that he now opposes the death penalty, calling for an end to the punishment he once helped revive in his state.During a news conference on Tuesday, DeWine explained that, as a young prosecutor and elected official, he once believed that capital punishment could serve as a deterrent to crime. But that argument, he said, no longer stands up to scrutiny.Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list“I do not believe that argument today can be successfully made, nor do I believe that there’s any chance in the future the facts that I’ve cited to support that belief will change,” the 79-year-old DeWine said. “Therefore, I believe Ohio should abolish the death penalty.”The governor’s change of heart comes as he reaches the end of his second and final term. Under Ohio’s term limits, DeWine is ineligible to compete for a third term in November’s midterm elections.His public shift also puts him at odds with the Republican Party establishment in the US.In April, Republican President Donald Trump announced plans to expand the use of the death penalty on the federal level, including through the proposed use of firing squads.A majority of Americans still support the use of the death penalty. But DeWine’s announcement comes at a time when people in the US are increasingly sceptical of the punishment.The research firm Gallup shows that support for capital punishment reached a high of 80 percent in 1994 but has steadily fallen over the decades to 52 percent in 2025. Kyle Rubin of Columbus, Ohio, protests against the death penalty in Terre Haute, Indiana, on July …
