i wouldn't read a thing and to that. >> do you think it would take a long time for them to sort out whether these planes are safe? a lot of americans are wondering. these planes are everywhere. is it safe to get on one? >> i can't answer that. i'm not an expert in that. i'm not directly involved in that. that we will not reopen the boeing routes and so forth until we are 100% satisfied of safety. from what i gather, boeing has come forward to make some adjustments in flight plans and software and sensors and pilot training and all kinds of things. narrative,ving you a they won't be back on the runways until we are absolutely, 100% satisfied that they are newsmakers with the

president's chief economic advisor. sunday at 10:00 and 6:00 eastern on c-span. at the table is robert dunham. ert dunham, executive director of the death penalty information center. good morning. thank you for joining us. guest: thank you for having me. host: what is the death penalty information center? guest: it is a national nonprofit organization. we provide information and analysis on death penalty issues. we don't take a position for or against the death penalty itself. host: one story that got her attention recently is this headline, governor kevin newsom from california has suspended the death penalty. what is going on? guest: california has the largest death row. they have not executed anybody

in a decade. there have been a lot of voter referenda to figure out what is going to happen. the governor was faced with the decision. he was being asked to approve a death penalty protocol, the manner by which people get executed. he went from having an intellectual issue to an emotional issue. am i going to preside over the executions of 25 people whose appeals have been exhausted? host: let's go to governor nixon. [video clip] opportunity inhe that spirit to reflect on the death penalty, on its purpose and the passion that arises when we debate the issue. i had the opportunity over the course of years to listen to people on all sides of the aisle

, visited san quentin, met on death row a young man that i went to high school with. he said, the remember me? the warden says he is a pretty good kid, but he killed his mom. understand the racial disparity, five year mandatory minimum for crack cocaine versus powder cocaine. sense of the many disparities in our criminal justice system. andve heard from experts have laid claim to what i think is a fair assessment of our criminal justice system, which is it is a lot better to be rich and guilty then poor and innocent. host: what is next?

what does the public think about this in california? next is the key issue. we don't know. if it is just a cause, it is largely -- pause, it is largely symbolic. we know that the 25 people whose appeals are exhausted are not going to be executed as long as wsom isr knew some -- nes in office. remove thelity to death penalty and sentenced to to lifeeople without parole. the governor would support an amendment that would do away with the death penalty in the state. host: robert dunham is the executive director of the death penalty information center.

if you support the death penalty, call (202) 748-8000. is (202)pose it, it 748-8001. let's move away from california for a minute. what other states around the country have been most active in changing the way they deal with the death penalty? guest: there is a lot going on right now. new hampshire just pass the bill sed awould abolish -- pas bill that would abolish the death penalty. they just passed a bill to remove the death penalty with a veto proof majority. new hampshire may abolish. there may be abolition in colorado. theington state declared death penalty unconstitutional

last october. in oregon, they are looking to redefine capital murder so that it only defines to acts of terrorism that result in more than one murder and takes everyone off of death row that is currently on death row. host: the number of executions since 1976, just under 1500. peaked around 1999 with around 99 executions. it has consistently gone down to about 25 last year. why has it gone down so much? and are individual states governors and legislatures deciding about the death penalty? these are the execution numbers. that is a lagging indicator. new debt sentences have fallen

even more. the fear of crime is not as great as it was in the 1990's when we had the false myth about super predators. murders have dropped by 30%. executions have dropped by 75%. new sentence is have dropped by 80%. 184 people who have been exonerated after being wrongly convicted to death. folks have become more aware of how frail some of the evidence is that people have been sentenced on. dna, which is available in very cases, all the other evidence was wrong. there is no reason to believe that evidence was any more reliable. host: that is part of what governor newsom said. he says if he were to sign these

executions, he would be executing people he knows are not guilty for one reason or another they would find out later. let's go to our phones, an opponent of the death penalty. you are on with robert dunham. caller: my name is kim. theard you guys express beingpenalty is actually -- i just oppose it. i oppose the death penalty because sometimes there have been many individuals that have been incarcerated under the death penalty and have been sentenced to death but have been innocent. you could beeve taking innocent lives, and i think i heard you guys expressing their been many executedat have been

and have been innocent. why iare my reasons oppose the death penalty. host: thank you. guest: philadelphia is an interesting place to look at with the death penalty. philadelphia has the third largest death row in the united states. in 2001, more african-americans were sentenced to death in philadelphia than in any other city or county in the u.s. sincee been tracking this 2001. debt sentences have dropped precipitously, down to fewer than one per year. general ranattorney for office saying he would not seek the death penalty. the city of philadelphia have no capital prosecutions last year. host: we talked about

california, in purple there. pennsylvania, 160. florida 353. alabama 185. texas 232. guest: one of the things that is really interesting about what gavin newsom did is not just the largest death row and executions are suspended, but two of the five largest death penalty states in the country have moratoriums. when you have the largest practitioners of a policy abandoning it, that tells you there is something wrong with it. it gives the states an opportunity to step back and take a breath that examine the policy more carefully when they are not under the threat of imminent executions. in pennsylvania, there was a commission that just issued a report that essentially validated all the criticisms,

saying the death penalty system is badly broken. the pennsylvania supreme court is now considering a case. they asked for briefing in a case that has the potential to declare the death penalty in that state unconstitutional. host: go ahead john. caller: good morning, c-span. i believe in the death penalty because i believe the death penalty puts fear in people that might commit a crime, and they won't because they don't want to be executed. if we keep these people in prison for all these years, the taxpayer ends up paying this horrendous amount of money supporting a killer to rot in jail. there is no redemption. host: thank you for calling. to specific points. speak first about his point of this putting fear in would-be criminals mines.

john, your reasons for supporting the death penalty are classic reasons. what is interesting is they are both mythical. the question of deterrence, there is no evidence that the death penalty deters. we did a 31 year study. we took a look at homicide rates across the united states for the past 31 years. we wanted to find out does the death penalty make police safer? if it does, it is a useful public policy 20. what we found is that -- tool. what we found is that murder rates are higher in states that have the death penalty. the rates at which police officers are killed is higher in states that have the death penalty. then we look at trends. maybe there is something special about states individually. the trends were the same. when murder rates went up in the

u.s., they went up in death penalty and non-death penalty states. the death penalty has no effect on murder rates. host: what about cost? how much it costs to keep somebody alive. think the death penalty would be cheaper. it is not. every study shows a system of justice that has capital punishment is far more expensive because the cost of the death penalty is not just the cost of an individual execution. it is the cost of all the cases in which the death penalty is pursued not returned, in which the death penalty is returned but overturned. the single most likely outcome of the capital case in the u.s. is not that he gets carried out. fewer than one in six get carried out. the single most likely outcome is that the death penalty is overturned. host: michael is on the line.

an opponent of the death penalty. you are on with robert dunham. caller: good morning, sir. host: what would you like to say? caller: i oppose the death penalty because to rights don't make the wrong. be innocent of the crimes. know, i just oppose it. host: anything you want to respond to? yes, do two wrongs make a right? i think everyone agrees the answer to that is no. one of the overlooked questions in terms of alternatives to capital is there a way of carrying out punishment so that you don't have a second wrong? we have a natural experiment the

u.s. 20 states don't have the death penalty. 30 states do. the 20 states that don't have the death penalty don't seem to have substantially worse problem with law enforcement. that is an interesting issue. hadhe olden days, we gruesome methods of execution, firing squad, hanging, electric chair. in the 1970's, we saw the movement to lethal injection, which was supposed to be much more humane. as time has gone on the pharmaceutical companies have said they don't want their medicines used to kill prisoners, states have had difficulty in obtaining execution drugs. they have been using inappropriate drugs. those executions have been described as torturers recently.

described fusion as akin to waterboarding followed by exposing the prisoner to chemical fire. what do you do with her method is torturous? some states have gone back to other methods. utah is back to the iron squad. tennessee the electric chair. oklahoma, mississippi, alabama adopting a gasp -- nitrogen gas. host: good morning, richard. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i missed the beginning of the show. if i say something factually incorrect, you can correct me. i understand the voters of california had the chance to overturn the death penalty. they did not do it. this is governor nixon imposing

wsom imposing his view on the voters. just to a process of reviewing those cases rather than stopping executions altogether. killer, issen's remember how awful he was to his father. do you want to tell the man that killed his daughter did not deserve to die? guest: there are three interesting points. did the governor to find the will of public -- to five the will of -- defy the will of the public? california, the

repealrejected referenda the death penalty in 2012 and 16, narrowly. adopted reforms to speed up the review process. that is not worked. withnor newsom was elected one million more votes than was voted to speed up the appellant process. the situation on the ground has changed. when people voted for governor they knew this position on the death penalty. the people of california will

sort out if they think that is appropriate or not. does whatson we elect he said he would do, i think it is hard to say that is defying the will of the people. on the question of individual justice, i think there are a number of people on death row that most people who support the death penalty in principle would say want to be executed. the problem with capital punishment is not that it can be justified in individual cases. the problem with capital punishment is it is a policy. it is something you have to be able to get right over and over again. we don't. that is the problem. you see with all the generations, and virtually all of these cases, these prisoners who did not commit the offense appealed their convictions and were told by the appeals courts there is overwhelming evidence of your guilt.

if you look at the record at trial, you would think everyone of these prisoners did it. unfortunately, the legal system has been very poor at being able to differentiate the two in the ones who did it and the ones who did not. what families of murder victims have to say about newsom's moratorium. her and lighting her body on fire in front of her children. i said, are you kidding me? i was angry. i have to live with this every day of my life. there's one question i would ask the governor, what if this was his daughter who was brutally murdered? guest: there are a lot of horrible crimes. that people are

unimaginable.s the sad reality is that the death penalty further victimizes surviving family members. has you have a system that ,ppeals that go on for 30 years and 30 years are necessary. most people that have been exonerated are not exonerated for decades. if you curtail the appeals process, you are more likely to execute innocent people. it reopens the worms every time. it is -- wounds every time. it is one reason more victims family members are opposing capital punishment. they don't want to be subjected to this process over and over. there is a myth that the death penalty will give these families closure. in fact, that does not happen or happens rarely.

you have to feel deeply. in thenot put yourself shoes of people who have suffered terrible loss, but the death penalty has not been good for families of victims. mr.er: i would like to have what, davis or durham -- host: donna. caller: answer the question, twice california voters voted to keep it. come in anddictator override the votes? that is my first question. hasnd, how many rape kits california not done? they don't do their job. what they are trying to do is save money, and it is just like the illegal aliens. let's not do for them.

let's not do anything about it. let's let them all out. this is becoming ridiculous. he doesn't show any statistics. he talks about 30 states, 20 states. what are the stats? you want to talk about brutalizing the victims. it istime it comes up, brutalizing the victim because they did not get death because their family can never see another individual again? they deserve to live? this is ridiculous, crazy. againstwsom is going the will of the people. this is not constitutional. that is in the california constitution. my correct? host: thank you. guest: you are not correct. the governor has the power to issue reprise. that is the constitutional power afforded to him. far from being dictatorial, he

was elected with more than 7 million votes, one million more votes than proposition 76 received. history changes over time. public views change over time. the public support of the death penalty, while a majority of americans if you ask the abstract question do you support the death penalty was say they support the death penalty, if you ask the policy question, what is the appropriate punishment for first-degree murder, more californians say life without parole is a more appropriate punishment. host: you oppose the death penalty. tell us what is going on in your state. good morning. thank you for taking my call. example.n obvious

whatever crimes the person has committed can be a reason we and someone's life for whatever need. the solution is not to kill them. societies.rove our thank you. interesteds actually in talking about what is happening in ohio. couldi want first if you address what she said. then we can speak about ohio. guest: on the question of what the appropriate

statesent is for murder, that have life without parole is the most harsh punishment don't have higher rates of murder or recidivism that states that have -- than states that the death penalty. countries that don't have the death penalty don't have were smarter problems -- worse murder problems than the united states does. you may want to have a death penalty, but if you are going to have it it is not for cost-saving, making the public saver. it does not do that. ohio, ohio is one of the few states in the u.s. that has carried out executions in recent years.

it has had a lot of problems. .t had one botched execution it had a second botched execution where a man who was terminally ill was scheduled to be executed, and the executioners are not find an execution vein. he died of natural causes. there was a federal judge who said executions are akin to torture. general took a look at what was happening and said we are not going to turn for people to death under my desk torture people to death under my watch. he has been granting reprieves. ohio has executions scheduled through 2022. it looks like most of these executions will not take place until the governor is satisfied

that they have a method that is not torture. host: kirk, go ahead. yes, do people that were shot and killed or run over, do they have time to say goodbye to their family for the next 30 years? guest: i think that is a rhetorical question. the answer to that is obviously no. that is the case whether someone gets sentenced to death or sentenced to life. host: we have been talking about the states. what should we know about the federal death penalty? we think of the death penalty, and many think of it as a national policy. people on0 -- 2700

death row, only 62 are on federal death row. 2% of the death penalty in the u.s. many people think of it as being reserved for acts of terrorism. rowpeople on federal death have committed offenses that are typically punished by state law. it is a must a lottery who on federal death row, the federal government prosecutes for capital murder. you can understand it if it was a crime committed on federal land or in acts of terrorism, but what we see a lot is just using things like the interstate commerce clause is the justification for seeking the death penalty because the crime involved a bank or the use of the weapon that was purchased in

interstate commerce. host: there is a supreme court case coming soon on the death penalty. guest: yes. it is flowers versus mississippi. this is a case in which curtis flowers, an african-american man in mississippi, has been tried six times by the same prosecutor for a quadruple murder. the community is split whether he committed the offense or not. the white residents almost universally believe he did it. the black residents almost universally believe he did not. it is a divisive case. prosecutor doug evans has struck almost every african-american juror in these trials. the only time in which he did or 11ve an all white jury whites and one black have resulted in mistrial. the question is whether the prosecutor has engaged in race discrimination. his office was 4.5 times more

likely to strike a jerk who was black than major who was low white -- was white. host: good morning. caller: i am actually from new york. my question is whether or not you are aware of the conditions of confinement for those on death row. i am aware there have been court cases about those on death row who are in solitary confinement and very harsh conditions. i have read about other states who have those on death row who actually have not so severe or restrictive conditions. i am curious to what extent you are aware to the conditions of confinement for those on death row and how they differ among the states. guest: the answer is they differ among the states. there is no such thing as the death row per se. differentlyreated

in different states. typically the people on death row are in what is called administrative segregation. solitary euphemism for confinement. typically, you are looking at somebody in a six foot by eight foot cell, about the size of a parking space. 22 tore in that cell for 23 hours per day. they can come out of the yard for an hour. maybe they can go to the law library. some states you have no contact visits with family members. everything is done through glass. others, you have personal contact with family members. there have been lawsuits filed in a number of states saying it is cruel and unusual punishment. the outcomes of those have differed from state to state. the general mood will be

away from harsh solitary confinement. matter, itectional makes things worse. solitary confinement will drive you crazy. with the majority of cases being overturned, it may pose a have futureazard in the for those that will be turned over to general population or in the case of people that may well be released into society. robertur guest is dunham, executive director of the death penalty information center. deat