A group called Jews Against Gassing went to the state Capitol on Holocaust Remembrance Day to try to put a stop to gas executions before they even begin.

BATON ROUGE, La. (BRPROUD) -- A group called Jews Against Gassing went to the state Capitol on Holocaust Remembrance Day to try to put a stop to gas executions before they even begin.

SB430 would remove nitrogen hypoxia, or gas suffocation, as a method of execution in Louisiana. Gas suffocation was added to the methods of executions in Louisiana just a couple of months ago in the special crime session. The method has only been put to use in Alabama so far and is facing litigation.

It’s been 79 years since six million Jews and five million non-Jews were killed in the Holocaust. Jewish community members are urging lawmakers to undo the gas method before it can be used, stating it is a call back to the trauma of their ancestors. 

“What I, as a Jewish leader, need to add to the conversation is that the use of poison gas for state-sanctioned execution unmistakably and immediately evokes for millions of American Jews horrific memories of the depravity our ancestors endured at the hands of Nazi Germany,” said Rabbi Phil Kaplan of Congregation Beth Israel.

The bill got bipartisan support in the Senate, with some senators who voted for the gas back in the crime session changing their votes.

“We cannot imagine it possible that Jewish communities anywhere could stand by while prisoners are executed in our names using any variation of that mechanism,” said Aaron Bloch of the Jewish Federation of Greater New Orleans.

The bill does not remove capital punishment as a whole. If the bill were to pass, the 56 inmates on Louisiana’s death row could still be executed by lethal injection or the electric chair.

With the possibility of a constitutional convention taking up the final two weeks of the legislative session, the bill will need a hearing soon to make it through the process. As of right now, the bill is not on the schedule for the committee and it will be up to the chairman if or when that bill will be heard.

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