Bipartisan backlash meets Pentagon plan to livestream Hasan execution

Trump approved Hasan’s death sentence this week on Hegseth’s recommendation

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth disclosed the execution details in an interview with Real America’s Voice, saying the firing squad would carry out the sentence at 1 p.m. on Thursday, 3 December, at Fort Hood, Texas. A defense department official later confirmed to reporters that the execution would be livestreamed, prompting immediate pushback from across the political divide. The Guardian reported that the execution would be the first U.S. military execution in more than 60 years.

Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, speaking on CNN, called the plan “disgusting.” “I mean, that’s disgusting. What, is he mimicking ISIS executions? I mean, I understand that in this country we have the death penalty, but public execution is medieval. It’s frankly one of the things that we abhor about terrorist groups, and the fact that the United States is doing it — I just learned this. That is just absolutely extraordinary, galling. No matter whether you support or oppose the death penalty, public hangings and executions? That’s what America has become? Um, that’s, that’s pretty extraordinary.”

Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina broke with the administration in a social media post, writing: “Hasan should face the death penalty, but making his execution public and streaming it? Beyond disgusting. Public executions are what oppressive dictatorships like Iran and Afghanistan do. It should not be happening in America.”

Democratic Sen. Patty Murray of Washington said the Pentagon should revoke the decision. “We can seek justice in this country without glorifying violence and turning an execution into a grotesque public spectacle,” Murray said in a statement. “What this criminal did was abhorrent and must be punished — but we as a country cannot condone livestreaming a man’s death for entertainment. We are long past the days of public hangings in the town square. Kids watch what our leaders do and say, is this kind of bloodshed really what we want them seeing? The Pentagon must revoke this decision immediately.”

Democratic Rep. Betty McCollum, in a statement, called the plan “disturbing” and said it should be stopped. “Secretary Hegseth’s desire to conduct a public execution is disturbing and should be stopped,” McCollum said. “The Army has not conducted an execution by firing squad since World War II and the U.S. has not had a public execution since 1936. Nidal Hasan has been found guilty of his crimes and should be held accountable for them but turning a federal execution into a media spectacle is appalling and unbecoming of the U.S. military.”

Hegseth defended the plan in his Real America’s Voice interview. “It was a radical Islamist attack in uniform inside the ranks, and so he’s going to get a firing squad of soldiers, as it should be, and we’ll make sure that people are able to watch it, that it’s public, because people need to understand there’s serious consequences for these types of things.”

The Pentagon’s announcement also drew criticism from human rights groups, and New Zealand’s national censor indicated the planned livestream could not be blocked.

Hasan, a former Army psychiatrist, opened fire at a medical processing center at Fort Hood on 5 November 2009, killing 13 people and wounding dozens more. A military jury sentenced him to death in 2013, and he has been held at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, ever since. He exhausted his appeals last year, which cleared the way for Trump to approve the sentence this week on a recommendation from Hegseth.

In other developments from the same Guardian live blog: In a televised Maine Senate debate, Democrat Troy Jackson said that, in addition to Brett Kavanaugh, Republican Susan Collins has voted to confirm dozens of anti-abortion judges. In a Michigan Senate debate, Republican Mike Rogers repeatedly accused the Democratic candidate Abdul El-Sayed, who is Muslim, of being “bought off by Hamas, Hezbollah, al-Qaida.” Donald Trump claimed that the U.S. will not strike Iran “at any time prior” to the midterm elections on 3 November.