Vice President JD Vance told reporters Friday that he does not know whether the execution of Nidal Hasan, scheduled for December 3 at Fort Hood, will be livestreamed. He added, "I'm not going to be watching it."
Hasan, who shot 13 people in 2009, will be the first U.S. military firing‑squad death since World War II, when a soldier was executed in 1945. The last firing‑squad execution in the U.S. was in 1961.
President Donald Trump endorsed the execution, calling Hasan a maniac, while Representative Austin Scott echoed support and warned that livestreaming would be a tactic used by extremists. Senator Mark Kelly, a Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said the public execution would echo Iran and Taliban practices.
Tech giants YouTube, Meta, and X declined to comment, and TikTok cited its policy banning graphic violence as a reason for not hosting the event. A Pentagon spokesperson confirmed the livestream, echoing Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s earlier statement that the execution would be public.
Hasan, who has been paralyzed since the attack, faces a death sentence imposed by a military jury in 2013. Twelve of the 13 soldiers killed and 30 wounded were his victims. The execution is set to proceed on December 3, with the livestream status still pending.