The gunman who killed 23 people in a racist attack at an El Paso Walmart in 2019 in one of the the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history has been offered a plea deal to avoid the death penalty, a Texas prosecutor said Tuesday.

The announcement by El Paso County District Attorney James Montoya is a significant turn in the criminal case of Patrick Crusius, 26, who was already sentenced to 90 consecutive life sentences after pleading guilty in 2023 to federal hate crime charges.

Under the Biden administration, federal prosecutors also took the death penalty off the table but did not explain why.

In addition to the federal case, Crusius was also charged in state court with one count of capital murder of multiple people and also multiple counts of assault with a deadly weapon.