House Bill 186 (2023): the alternative-method statute
Idaho’s legislature authorized the firing squad as an alternative execution method, to be used only when lethal injection was unavailable. Governor Little signed the bill on March 24, 2023, and it took effect July 1 of that year. The measure was framed publicly as a contingency addressing the state’s documented difficulty acquiring lethal injection drugs, rather than as an endorsement of the firing squad on independent merit.
House Bill 37 (2025): the inversion
Introduced in January 2025 with sixteen Republican co-sponsors, House Bill 37 reversed the 2023 hierarchy, making the firing squad Idaho’s primary method of execution and lethal injection the fallback, available only if the firing squad is held unconstitutional, is unavailable, or otherwise cannot be used.
The Idaho House passed the bill on February 6, 2025, by a vote of 58 to 11. The Idaho Senate passed it on March 5, 2025, by a vote of 28 to 7. Governor Brad Little signed it on March 12, 2025. It took effect on July 1, 2026.
Across both chambers, only three Republican legislators voted against the bill: Representatives Lori McCann of Lewiston and Benjamin Goode, serving that week as a substitute, in the House, and Senator Dan Foreman of Viola in the Senate. All fifteen Democratic legislators in the two chambers voted no.
House Bill 380 (2025): the companion capital statute
Passed in the same legislative session, House Bill 380 was sponsored by Representative Bruce Skaug and House Assistant Majority Leader Josh Tanner. It creates a new criminal offense, aggravated lewd conduct with a child age twelve or younger, and makes that offense punishable by death where the statutorily specified aggravating factors are present. It also establishes mandatory minimum sentences for aggravated lewd conduct with minors age sixteen and under that do not meet the criteria for capital eligibility.
The Idaho House passed the bill unanimously on March 17, 2025, with seven members absent. The Idaho Senate passed it 30 to 5 on March 24. Governor Little signed it on March 27, 2025. The statute exists in evident tension with the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2008 ruling in Kennedy v. Louisiana, which held that the Eighth Amendment bars capital punishment for the rape of a child where the crime did not result in, and was not intended to result in, the victim’s death.
House Bill 803 (2026): shielding the apparatus
Signed by Governor Little on March 31, 2026 and effective July 1, 2026, the same day the firing squad became Idaho’s primary method, House Bill 803 does two things. It exempts the Department of Correction’s execution procedures from judicial review under the state Administrative Procedure Act, meaning the corrections director may revise the execution protocol without public notice and without ordinary judicial oversight, subject only to constitutional challenge. And it extends the state’s execution secrecy provisions to members of the firing squad and to any person or entity providing what the statute calls technical assistance during an execution, a phrase the statute does not define. The measure had stalled earlier in the session as House Bill 525 before being reintroduced.