WASHINGTON — The Pentagon said Thursday that the firing squad execution of Fort Hood shooter Nidal Malik Hasan will be livestreamed, confirming that the proceedings will be made public.
The announcement followed remarks by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who said the execution would take place at Fort Hood on Dec. 3.
Hasan was convicted of killing 13 people and injuring 32 others in a shooting at the military base in 2009.
“We’ll make sure that people are able to watch it, that it’s public,” Hegseth said Wednesday during an interview with the conservative outlet Real America’s Voice News.
Hegseth spoke aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier while visiting the crew before their arrival at their home port in San Diego.
When asked if Hasan had made any final requests or reached out to the Trump administration, Hegseth replied: “Don’t care. We’ll see him on December 3rd.”
Pentagon officials clarified Thursday that the execution will be livestreamed and that additional details would follow.
Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell had said Monday that President Donald Trump approved the execution of Hasan.
Trump has previously criticized public executions in Iran, at times citing the possibility of protesters being killed by the Iranian government as a rationale for military action.
“We’ve been told that the killing in Iran is stopping,” Trump told reporters on Jan. 14. “It’s stopping and there’s no plan for executions.”
He repeated the claim on Jan. 20 at a White House press briefing, saying: “We let them know that if that happens, that will be a very bad day for them. And they decided not to do it. They didn’t hang the people.”
In his State of the Union address, Trump said, “We stopped them from hanging a lot of them with the threat of serious violence.”
The White House on Thursday referred questions about the livestreamed execution plans to the Pentagon.
Experts on military law said Hasan could resist execution and file a habeas petition in civilian court, which could significantly delay the proceedings.
“It frankly might outlast the current administration, and who knows if the next one will have the same penchant for executions,” said Eugene R. Fidell, a visiting lecturer at Yale Law School specializing in military law.
Hasan, an Army psychiatrist who held the rank of major, entered a medical building at Fort Hood where soldiers were waiting in long lines for immunizations and medical clearance before deployment.
He shouted “Allahu akbar” — Arabic for “God is great!” — and opened fire with a laser-sighted handgun, according to witness accounts and trial testimony.
During the trial, it was revealed that Hasan spent weeks planning the attack.
His preparation included videotaping a sales clerk showing him how to change the magazine on the pistol he purchased.
He later went to a gun range outside Austin and asked an instructor for advice on how to reload with speed and precision.
Soldiers testified that Hasan’s rapid reloading made it nearly impossible to stop the shooting.
Investigators recovered 146 shell casings inside the building and dozens more outside, where Hasan shot at soldiers fleeing toward the parking lot.
Hasan said the attack was an effort to stop soldiers from going to Afghanistan and killing his fellow Muslims.
A military judge barred him from presenting that as a defense during his trial.
Hasan made almost no effort to defend himself in court, telling jurors when he acted as his own counsel that evidence would show he was the shooter and describing himself as a soldier who had “switched sides.”
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Hegseth said the military has not executed a service member by firing squad since World War II.
The last military execution took place on April 13, 1961, when Army Pvt. John Bennett was hanged.
The execution is scheduled for 1 p.m. Central Time on Dec. 3 at Fort Hood, according to acting Army Secretary Adam Telle.
Telle said in a social media post that Trump approved the execution on Oct. 2, starting a timeline that requires an execution date to be set no sooner than 60 days and no later than 150 days after approval.
It remains unclear whether Hasan will seek to challenge or delay the execution through further appeals in federal court.
Hasan has been held on military death row at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, since his conviction.
He is paralyzed from the chest down and uses a wheelchair after being shot by police during his arrest.
