attorney general

SACRAMENTO — Democrat Xavier Becerra defended the death penalty while serving as California’s attorney general, a punishment his office actively sought in the case of a gunman convicted of an Orange County mass shooting, but as the front-running candidate for governor he has vowed to block executions if elected in November.

Becerra said he will extend the blanket reprieve for all death row inmates that Gov. Gavin Newsom enacted by executive order in 2019, saying he supported “moving our state away from a costly, flawed system that disproportionately impacts Black and brown communities and too often gets it wrong.”

Those comments have reassured anti-death penalty advocates wary of Becerra, who has stated throughout his career that capital punishment should be an option for victims seeking justice. He reiterated that stance just a decade ago during his confirmation hearing for attorney general, though he also expressed concerns about the unjust application of the punishment.

“I support the death penalty, but I hate the way it’s being executed,” Becerra told state lawmakers in 2017.

“If you commit some heinous crime where you have taken the life of someone else, and you knew that there was a death penalty in place in that place where you committed that crime, then you should face the punishment for what you’ve done,” he explained. “It doesn’t give me pleasure to say that, but I simply do believe there’s a simple justice in that.”

Becerra’s challenger in the Nov. 3 election, former Fox News commentator Steve Hilton, opposes the death penalty but said he would rescind Newsom’s moratorium because it defies the will of voters.

Becerra has said he is concerned by how death sentences historically have been applied, including a highly disproportionate number of condemned inmates who are Black or Latino men and cases in which they later have been exonerated of crimes.

He repeated similar positions last year during a gubernatorial forum in Los Angeles.

“I do not believe every Californian has gotten a fair verdict in these fights,” he said in response to a question about extending Newsom’s moratorium. “But here is what I will tell you: We have to be aggressive in going after crime, especially the most heinous crime. … I will make sure that we have a judiciary system and a prosecution system that takes into account that we must show fairness.”

Though California has not performed an execution since 2006, prosecutors in some areas of the state continue to seek and win death sentences. As of early August, there were 565 condemned inmates in California prisons, according to the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

Newsom’s moratorium stops the state from carrying out those sentences.

In California, county district attorneys are responsible for prosecuting the vast majority of accused murderers when they go to trial and also deciding whether to seek the death penalty. The office of the state attorney general is responsible for defending death penalty convictions on appeal.

Becerra sought the death penalty in a murder case his office prosecuted early in his tenure, though unsuccessfully. Scott Dekraai, who was convicted of killing his ex-wife and seven others in a shooting at a Seal Beach beauty salon, was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole after a prosecution scandal involving his case.

Some death penalty opponents criticized Becerra for fighting to uphold the death sentence of Robert Lewis Jr., who was deemed by the California Supreme Court in 2018 to have an intellectual disability that made him ineligible for execution.

“I find that reprehensible,” said Mike Farrell, president of Death Penalty Focus, an advocacy group. A longtime anti-death penalty activist, Farrell is better-known for starring as B.J. Hunnicutt in the TV show “M*A*S*H.”

“It may not have been his idea, but he was part of that process,” he said of Becerra.

Others said Becerra cannot be blamed for doing his job. Former Vice President Kamala Harris faced the same dilemma when she served as state attorney general, as does Rob Bonta, who currently holds the office.

“The AG is in a different position because it’s just inherent in their role to defend convictions and sentences,” said Natasha Minsker of the California Anti-Death Penalty Coalition. “For example, Kamala Harris is very strongly personally opposed to the death penalty and still, while she was AG, the office defended hundreds of death sentences. Same with Rob Bonta. He’s very clearly personally against the death penalty, and his office continues to defend death sentences.”

Becerra’s campaign declined an interview on the subject and referred to his statement in support of extending Newsom’s freeze on executions.

Hilton, his Republican opponent in the race, holds starkly different views.

“If you’re arguing that taking a life is such a serious crime, then I don’t think responding by taking a life actually makes that argument,” he said in an interview last month.

But he said California voters spoke clearly by voting twice — in 2012 and 2016 — against ballot measures that would have repealed the death penalty. “I don’t think it’s OK for a governor to just substitute their personal opinion on an issue where the voters had an explicit and direct say,” he said.

“I strongly believe in holding people accountable for what they do,” Hilton said. “But my sort of fundamental belief is that if we’re saying it’s wrong to kill someone, then the state shouldn’t be doing it, either.”

Hilton also would roll back Democratic-led reforms that have shortened many inmates’ prison sentences by allowing them to seek parole sooner.

End or extend? It’s not that simple

Even if a governor rescinds the moratorium, resuming executions would be a long and complicated process because the state has no approved protocol or facilities to carry out death sentences.

Newsom ordered the dismantling of San Quentin’s death row and execution chamber. Even before he took office, the state’s use of lethal injection drugs was part of a long-running and now-dormant legal battle. And a dwindling number of attorneys who specialize in death penalty cases meant 70% of condemned inmates did not have a lawyer at the end of last year, according to a state report.

California’s death penalty also faces a new legal challenge from groups arguing that capital punishment cases have been administered in a way that is racially discriminatory. In May, the California Supreme Court ordered the attorney general’s office to respond to the arguments and assigned the case to a superior court.

The shifts in California’s criminal justice system are reflected in legal battles waged by the pro-death penalty Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, a nonprofit that supports victims of crime and their families in court.

“We used to do a lot of work in the capital punishment area because that was the area where justice and the sentences were under the greatest attack,” said Kent Scheidegger, the group’s legal director.

But as California’s Democratic-controlled Legislature, governor and, at times, voters adopted measures aimed at reducing the prison population, Scheidegger said the foundation’s efforts increasingly are focused on preserving “the finality of sentences.”

Many capital cases were negotiated as “plea bargains to life without parole on the express promise that this will provide the finality that the victims need most,” he said. “Life without possibility of parole, until recently, meant life without possibility of parole. And now we’ve got one action after another coming out of the government to break down that finality and give people sentenced to life without parole opportunities to get out.”

The group has challenged attempts to expand early release for violent offenders under 2016’s Proposition 57 and new regulations that would allow people sentenced to life without the possibility of parole to seek release.

Twenty-seven states allow the death penalty, but governors in four of them — California, Ohio, Oregon and Pennsylvania — have paused executions.

Slow shifts in public opinion

Attitudes about capital punishment have shifted over time. A 2025 Gallup poll showed 52% of Americans favor the death penalty for people convicted of murder, down from its peak of 80% in 1994.

In a 2023 survey by the Public Policy Institute of California, 62% of adults in the state said they “strongly favor” or “somewhat favor” the death penalty in murder cases. When asked which punishment they prefer for a first-degree murder case, 55% said life without parole and 43% chose the death penalty. More than three-quarters believe there “is some risk that an innocent person will be put to death.”

Despite the changing opinions, Minsker, of the California Anti-Death Penalty Coalition, said there’s little appetite for another repeal attempt because of how expensive ballot measure campaigns have become.

“I am personally one of the strongest proponents of ending the death penalty, and I am not sure I would spend $30 million on that right now, given all the other needs that California has,” said Minsker, a former attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union who ran the unsuccessful 2012 death penalty repeal measure.

Putting an anti-death penalty measure on the statewide ballot also could have put Newsom in an precarious political position. If it failed, Californians would be sending a stinging rebuke to the Democratic governor’s executive decision to grant a blanket reprieve to all condemned inmates.

Minsker is leading a group of criminal justice advocates, faith organizations, prosecutors, murder victim family members and others urging Newsom to commute every death sentence in California before he leaves office.

But advocates are unsure whether Newsom, who is considering a run for president in 2028, would risk the backlash a mass commutation would probably bring. The California Supreme Court also must review executive clemency actions for inmates with more than one felony charge.

Commuting all death sentences to life in prison “would be the coup de grâce,” Farrell said. “However, politically, I’m sure those who are advising him are urging him to have caution in that regard.”

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche’s fidelity to President Trump nearly cost him his confirmation. Now comes Blanche’s real test.

Trump’s former personal attorney has stepped into the commanding role facing a challenge that other leaders of the Republican president’s Department of Justice could not overcome: threading the needle between Trump’s boundary-busting demands and a prosecutor’s duty to uphold the rule of law. At the same time, Blanche must try to stabilize a workforce shaken by an exodus of experienced lawyers and an erosion of trust in the judicial branch.

In a wide-ranging interview with the Associated Press during a trip to Puerto Rico this week, Blanche promised to lead the department with integrity, dismissing concerns from critics who say his actions so far — including an indictment against longtime Trump foe and former FBI Director James Comey — call into question whether Blanche is still functioning as Trump’s personal lawyer.

A slew of ongoing politically charged investigations under Blanche’s watch could force him to choose between his long-standing loyalty to the president and the foundational principles of the Cabinet agency he leads. At stake is the fate of a department already reeling under a president who has made clear his desire for retribution over the criminal scrutiny he faced.

“My integrity, my commitment to the rule of law is the same today that it was the day I graduated,” Blanche told the AP when asked where he would draw the line on requests from the White House. “I would never do anything unethical or improper or violate my oath, no matter the circumstances.”

Critics disagree.

As acting attorney general, Blanche came under fire from lawmakers, including many Republicans, for signing off on a $1.8 billion fund meant to compensate Trump’s allies who believed they were politically prosecuted. He also greenlit a deal that granted Trump, the Trump Organization, and two of his sons immunity from tax audits. Those moves, unusual steps aimed at granting the president and his allies far-reaching benefits, put Blanche’s confirmation at risk, prompting key senators to express concern.

Blanche, like Trump’s other attorneys general, walks a tightrope

In the AP interview, Blanche addressed criticism of the department under his leadership, his priorities as attorney general and losses the administration has had in high-profile cases. He also depicted the Justice Department as an institution whose independence had eroded long ago — a characterization at odds with decades of fierce autonomy that challenged the highest echelons of power in Washington and beyond.

Blanche, a former federal prosecutor in New York, is walking the same tightrope as Trump’s three other Senate-confirmed attorneys general. They found their pledges to uphold the rule of law and the department’s ethical norms at odds with the president’s demands to bend the institution to his will.

During Trump’s first term, one attorney general infuriated Trump over his withdrawal from an investigation into Trump’s winning White House campaign and was forced out. Another submitted his resignation weeks after breaking with Trump over Trump’s false claims of election fraud. Blanche’s immediate predecessor, Pam Bondi, was ousted in April after failing to deliver successful prosecutions against the president’s political enemies.

Blanche’s narrow confirmation this month over opposition from two Republican senators underscored growing concerns about the dismantling of the Justice Department’s long-standing tradition of independence from the White House, which is meant to protect the impartiality of politically sensitive investigations and prosecutions.

Concerns that the Justice Department is being weaponized

Blanche bristles at the suggestion that the Justice Department should be independent of the president and he has made clear his view that the executive has both the power and the right to shape and control the law enforcement agency.

He has staunchly defended the integrity of cases the administration has brought against the president’s perceived political opponents, often pointing to his own experience representing Trump in criminal cases brought by Democratic President Joe Biden’s Justice Department. Blanche and the president have characterized those cases as politically motivated.

“I think attorneys general and others have said, ‘Oh, we’re independent.’ I don’t think that’s actually true,” Blanche told the AP.

Blanche claimed the Justice Department was not truly independent when he was a federal prosecutor or during the Biden administration. But that characterization ignores the fact that under Biden, the Justice Department investigated Biden himself over his handling of classified documents and secured felony charges in two separate cases against his son Hunter before Biden pardoned him.

The two criminal cases filed by special counsel Jack Smith against Trump were based on allegations, supported by long-running investigations, that Trump had classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida and obstructed government efforts to get them back, and conspired to overturn the 2020 election.

Growing distrust of the Justice Department among judges

Blanche has sought to highlight the administration’s focus on tackling illegal immigration, violent crime and drug-trafficking cartels, spotlighting cases such as the takedown of a Puerto Rican gang that he announced during his visit to the U.S. island territory.

But Blanche’s policy priorities are often overshadowed by a growing number of investigations that have drawn criticism that the department is being used as a weapon in the president’s campaign of retribution.

Blanche’s supporters have argued that the close relationship he developed with Trump while serving as his criminal defense lawyer can make him more effective at pushing back on or explaining the legal constraints of the president’s demands. Others wonder whether he will fare any better than Bondi up against the same skeptical court system, and factual and legal hurdles, that impeded efforts to deliver the sought-after results.

Blanche is also confronting growing distrust of the Justice Department among judges, who in multiple cases have accused government lawyers of withholding information or misleading courts. Courts in some cases have quashed subpoenas or ordered the review of grand jury transcripts, and the criminal cases against Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James were dismissed after a judge found the prosecutor who brought them was illegally appointed.

But Blanche played down concerns that the erosion of judicial trust could impede his efforts to advance his agenda.

“The isolated incidents that make the news are not reflective of the way the bench feels in my view, or the way prosecutors are doing their job around the country,” Blanche said.

Richer writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Eric Tucker in Washington contributed to this report.

California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta made it clear Tuesday he holds the power to extract major concessions in the battle over the proposed Paramount-Warner Bros. merger.

A day after canceling settlement talks, Bonta said he remains open to meeting with Paramount Skydance executives to find remedies to resolve the antitrust lawsuit stalling David Ellison’s $111-billion takeover, but called on the company to end its “amateur hour” conduct.

“If you want to have an adult, legitimate, serious settlement discussion — no problem,” Bonta said during an appearance in Los Angeles. “But if you want to play games, we’ve got better things to do.”

The attorney general, who is leading the coalition of 12 states that filed an antitrust lawsuit to block the merger, repeated his stance that Paramount must make significant concessions to end the court battle — such as selling cable television channels. However, Ellison has been resistant because his company will need the steady cash-flow from Warner’s basic cable channels, including TBS, TNT and CNN, to make payments on $80-billion in debt Paramount will take on to finance the industry-reshaping deal.

Ellison’s promise to release 30 movies a year, following the merger, won’t cut it, the attorney general said.

Bonta, who was speaking at press conference to highlight public safety, expressed frustration with Paramount afterweeks of drama.

Paramount first threatened to leave California if Bonta continues to wage his court battle. Then, on Friday, Paramount accused actor Mark Ruffalo (a staunch deal critic) of making antisemitic comments, prompting prominent Jewish organizations to join the fray. One Jewish leader suggested Bonta was in cahoots with Ruffalo.

That wasn’t the issue, Bonta said, specifically pointing to leaks about the settlement talks that appeared in various news outlets.

Some reports suggested Bonta’s office sought the negotiations amid withering political pressure. Gov. Gavin Newsom, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and Xavier Becerra, the Democratic nominee for governor, have separately urged a settlement to end the antitrust fight.

Bonta set the record straight: “Paramount reached out to us to have settlement discussions,” he said. “They asked for them.”

Bonta’s beef was that the substance of the nascent negotiations appeared in newspaper articles despite both sides agreeing to hold confidential talks, Bonta said, adding that crossed the line. The Wall Street Journal reported that California’s top prosecutor planned to ask Paramount for agreements to keep Warner Bros. and the Paramount Pictures film studios separate units as well as an agreement to sell some cable channels.

“We thought they were reaching out to us in good faith … unfortunately, they violated the rules of engagement,” Bonta said. “They leaked lies to the press while we were in settlement negotiations. That’s not okay … That is amateur hour.”

Paramount declined to comment. On Monday, Paramount denied it was the source of the leaks.

Bonta’s comments appeared as a show of strength after major court wins.

The coalition of attorneys general, who also represent New York, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada and Oregon, last month won a temporary restraining order that blocked Paramount from closing the deal. Rather than lose in a hearing over a more consequential preliminary injunction, Paramount voluntarily agreed that it would not finalize the transaction until after the trial or by June 1, whichever date comes first.

U.S. District Court Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín set a March 2 trial, which was in line with the plaintiff states’ request. Paramount had lobbied for a November date.

“We are winning in this lawsuit,” Bonta said. “They have eight of the biggest law firms in the country, making every imaginable argument under the sun. And they lost, the judge said: ‘You are likely to lose this case’… the states are likely to succeed on the merits.”

For now, no new settlement talks are scheduled.

Bonta expressed an openness to finding a truce.

“If they are willing to clean things up, put a lid on their lying leaks and engage in a way that is sincere and in good faith, we will be where we always are … happy to meet,” Bonta said.

Staff writer Kevin Rector contributed to this report.