Death penalty could return in nation's capital under Trump’s DC crime crackdown

President Donald Trump said he plans to pursue reviving the death penalty in Washington for those convicted of murder amid his crime crackdown in the nation’s capital. 

"If somebody kills somebody in the capital, Washington, D.C., we're going to be seeking the death penalty," Trump told reporters during a Tuesday Cabinet meeting. "And that's a very strong preventative. And everybody that's heard it agrees with it. I don't know if we're ready for it in this country, but we have it. … We have no choice." 

The 1972 Supreme Court decision in Furman v. Georgia determined that the death penalty violated the Eighth Amendment's provision barring cruel and unusual punishment...