WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump proposed the death penalty for anyone who kills a firefighter, escalating his calls for capital punishment beyond his previous pushes for those who kill police officers or for government officials who leak information to reporters.
He told a gathering of law enforcement officers and firefighters in the White House Rose Garden that he directed Attorney General Todd Blanche to pursue the death penalty for being convicted of killing anyone in their ranks.
“As president I will always stand with those who stand on the front lines of law enforcement and fighting fires,” Trump said Oct. 15.
His comments came with public attention focused on capital punishment after the attempted state execution of Christa Pike in Tennessee
and his decision not to livestream the Pentagon execution of a gunman who killed 13 people at Fort Hood.
Trump resumed enforcing the death penalty during his first term with 16 federal executions from July 2020 to January 2021, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. But President Joe Biden commuted the death sentences of 37 men in 2024 before Trump returned to the White House and resumed his pursuit of capital punishment.
Trump said he aimed to stop firefighters from being shot at while climbing ladders to fight fires in “rough neighborhoods.”
“They’re shot at going up ladders,” Trump said. “They get shot up in some neighborhoods. You ought to blow up the damn place.”
Trump told Blanche the punishment would deter more violence.
“You’ll see shootings will stop very quickly,” Trump said.
Steve Hirsch, chairman of the National Volunteer Fire Council, which represents 750,000 firefighters, presented Trump with a helmet.
“We want God to wrap his protective arm around you,” Hirsch said.
Trump said he could have used it during a 2024 assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania, where he was shot in the ear.
“I could have used this in Butler,” Trump said. “This would have been very helpful.”
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Trump demands death penalty for anyone who kills a firefighter
