The newly inaugurated president's directive fulfills a key part of Project 2025's right-wing mandate for his administration.

Trump's order, coming just hours after he returned to the White House, compels the Justice Department to not only seek the death penalty in appropriate federal cases but also to help preserve capital punishment in states that have struggled to maintain adequate supplies of lethal injection drugs.

President Donald Trump signed a sweeping executive order on the death penalty Monday, directing the attorney general to “take all necessary and lawful action” to ensure that states have enough lethal injection drugs to carry out executions.