Page:William P. Barr, Attorney General. Et Al. v. Daniel Lewis Lee, Et Al.pdf/3

Rh Per Curiam Against this backdrop, the plaintiffs cite new expert declarations suggesting that pentobarbital causes prisoners to experience "flash pulmonary edema," a form of respiratory distress that temporarily produces the sensation of drowning or asphyxiation. But the Government has produced competing expert testimony of its own, indicating that any pulmonary edema occurs only after the prisoner has died or been rendered fully insensate. The plaintiffs in this case have not made the showing required to justify last-minute intervention by a Federal Court. "Last-minute stays" like that issued this morning "should be the extreme exception, not the norm." Bucklew, 587 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 30). It is our responsibility "to ensure that method-of-execution challenges to lawfully issued sentences are resolved fairly and expeditiously," so that "the question of capital punishment" can remain with "the people and their representatives, not the courts, to resolve." Id., at ___–___ (slip op., at 29–30). In keeping with that responsibility, we vacate the District Court's preliminary injunction so that the plaintiffs' executions may proceed as planned.