Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost (R) on Tuesday endorsed a bill that could allow the state to execute death row inmates by nitrogen gas.
This comes after Alabama became the first state to execute someone with nitrogen gas last week.
“I support this bill,” Yost said. “Saying that the law of Ohio should be thwarted, or be able to be thwarted, because pharmaceutical companies don't want to sell the chemicals, it is an abdication of the sovereignty of the state of Ohio, which still has this law on its books.”
Ohio has not executed any death row inmates since 2018, when a de-facto moratorium was put in place, after the state claimed there was a lack of access to drugs used for lethal injection.
Yost acknowledged the debate around the death penalty, but argued that capital punishment is necessary and the wait has gone on too long.
“The average time on death row for a death row inmate now is nearly 21 years.” Yost said, adding that death row inmates are “the worst of the worst, whose sentences are deserved, who are still sitting and awaiting their day of justice.”
“This is an exercise in democracy,” the attorney general continued. “I am aware of the moral weight of this debate. But this is the law of the land.”
