The Arc of the United States joined hundreds of stakeholders from across the political and faith spectrums to call on President Biden to commute federal death sentences before he leaves office. Several men on death row have intellectual disabilities, despite U.S. Supreme Court rulings that prohibit their execution.

Below is our full letter that was sent to President Biden on December 2, 2024.

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Dear President Biden,

The Arc of the United States, founded in 1950, is the largest organization of and for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities in the country. Together with nearly 600 statewide and local chapters, The Arc promotes and protects the human and civil rights of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, supporting their full inclusion and participation in the community throughout their lifetimes.

President Biden, we address you with urgency regarding the decision you must make about exercising your power to review the records of and grant sentence commutation to any individual on federal death row who has demonstrated a diagnosis of intellectual disability. Based on what we know about the federal death penalty as it affects people with intellectual disability, we urge you to show mercy and, consistent with the platform on which you ran for President, act to spare the lives of those with intellectual disability currently on federal death row.

The Arc has long advocated for capital defendants with intellectual disability. We were encouraged when the Supreme Court, in Atkins v. Virginia, recognized their vulnerability to wrongful conviction and excessive punishment and held that the Constitution prohibits executing people with intellectual disability. We were optimistic when, in subsequent decisions like Hall v. Florida and Moore v. Texas, the Court rejected reliance on arbitrary IQ cutoffs and stereotypes for diagnosis and when it held that determinations of intellectual disability must be made in accordance with the best medical science and well-established clinical standards.

However, we have seen first-hand that these safeguards often fail. In both state and federal courts, people with intellectual disability are repeatedly tried, convicted, sentenced to death, and – tragically – executed, notwithstanding the constitutional bar. In 2020 and 2021, The Arc was dismayed to see the federal government execute Corey Johnson and Alfred Bourgeois, who had both been diagnosed with intellectual disability by highly regarded experts in the field; men whose disabilities were entirely overlooked or inadequately investigated by their trial counsel.

These men’s deaths – these executions by our federal government – were breaches of constitutional safeguards. And unless you act, President Biden, we are poised to see deaths like these again, because similar problems exist on federal death row today.

For example, Chadrick Fulks, who is currently on federal death row, has structural brain damage stemming from prenatal alcohol exposure and has suffered from significant cognitive and adaptive deficits since birth. At the time his initial § 2255 motion was filed, six mental health experts had concluded that Mr. Fulks had significant impairments, but that his IQ was just above the then-imposed cutoff score for a formal diagnosis of intellectual disability to be made under the diagnostic standards in place at that time. As a result of advancements in the fields of IQ testing and intellectual disability, diagnostic standards have since rejected hard IQ-score cutoffs in the diagnosis of intellectual disability. Additionally, current diagnostic standards now require that these scores be corrected for the inflation that occurs as IQ tests age. Under these current standards, Mr. Fulks’s IQ score falls squarely within the range for intellectual disability, he meets all other criteria for the diagnosis, and multiple experts have diagnosed him as a person with intellectual disability. However, because the courts have refused to hear Mr. Fulks’s intellectual disability claim on procedural grounds, he will be eligible for execution should executions resume even though he is a person with intellectual disability and his execution should be prohibited under Atkins.

Several other men currently under federal death sentence have been diagnosed with intellectual disability by developmental disability experts. Others have amassed strong evidence of cognitive deficits that point to such a diagnosis, but the posture of their case precludes review of their claim. Although the Supreme Court has rejected scientifically unreliable diagnostic standards, federal prosecutors nevertheless stand by findings that were based on such methods, as in the example above, and consistently oppose any court review on procedural grounds or rely on those same antiquated standards to rebut the claim. Even when judges would like to grant relief, or just a hearing, they find that their hands are tied and they cannot provide the relief the constitution requires.
At this time, then, there are men on federal death row with well-established diagnoses of intellectual disability and others with strong but unreviewed claims of intellectual disability. You would not subject any of these men to execution, but they will die if you do not act. It happened when Corey Johnson and Alfred Bourgeois were executed. Morally, ethically, and legally, we believe this calls for the mercy that is your executive prerogative.

We know that the men on federal death row caused terrible, irreparable harm. The Arc has deep sympathy for the victims of these crimes and for their families and friends. The Arc supports, without reservation, the appropriate prosecution and punishment of all responsible parties. The Arc does not seek to eliminate punishment of people with disabilities but, rather, to ensure that justice is served and the rights of all are protected, so that any punishment is consistent with the constitutional restrictions of the Eighth Amendment.

Because of our work and expertise in this area, we are aware that a person’s disability is sometimes not discovered until a later stage of their case, and that it can be misunderstood or overlooked by the judges and juries who are making decisions about their lives – and sometimes even by their own lawyers. We are concerned that this creates a great risk that a capital defendant will not have their ID properly identified and acknowledged in time for the courts to intervene.

We write to express our concern with this risk, as well as our hope that whatever actions you choose to take regarding the federal death row are done with respect for the spirit of the Atkins decision.

President Biden, you can ensure that those with intellectual disability are removed from the risk of wrongful execution. This would be a significant step toward addressing the systemic flaws that have allowed the execution of people with intellectual disability, contrary to the Constitution and federal law. It would be a proud legacy for you and for the American people.
We are grateful for your consideration and for your service as our President.

Respectfully,

Katy Neas
Chief Executive Officer
The Arc of the United States