Ohio’s Republican attorney general is putting his weight behind a legislative effort that would bring nitrogen gas executions to the state and end a yearslong unofficial moratorium on the death penalty. Attorney General Dave Yost made remarks in a news conference Tuesday about a bill sponsored by Republican state Reps. Brian Stewart and Phil Plummer. It would require that the nitrogen hypoxia pioneered in Alabama last week be used in cases where lethal injection drugs are not available. Ohio hasn’t executed anyone since 2018. Republican Gov. Mike DeWine in 2020 declared lethal injection “no longer an option,” citing a federal judge’s ruling.
