The Pentagon confirmed plans to livestream the execution of former Army Major Nidal Hasan, who is scheduled to die by firing squad on December 3.
Hasan killed 13 people and wounded dozens more during a 2009 mass shooting at Fort Hood in Texas.However, the proposal to broadcast his execution publicly raised legal and ethical concerns.
Justice or Entertainment?
Among those criticizing the livestream proposal is Republican Senator John Curtis, who questioned the morality of broadcasting an execution.
Reuters cited Curtis as saying on social media, “A civilization erodes when it cultivates an appetite for executions as a form of entertainment.”
While President Donald Trump supported the execution of Nidal Hasan by firing squad, he said he hadn’t yet decided whether to approve the livestream. President JD Vance distanced himself from the idea.
According to the Associated Press, Vance said, “Whatever the controversy is about the method of the execution, I hope that people don’t forget that this is a guy who brutally murdered a lot of innocent people.”
But he also added, “Now, that said, I mean, look, if it’s ultimately livestreamed, I’m not going to be watching it.”
A Historic Proposal
Nidal Hasan was sentenced to death by a military jury in 2013 for the deadly attack at Fort Hood.
Military justice expert Eugene Fidell told CBS News that a public execution would violate the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
The last US military firing squad execution occurred in 1945, while the last military execution by any method was in 1961. Capital punishment is an accepted penalty. However, killing him by firing squad while the world watches would be unprecedented.
Nevertheless, per THV11 on YouTube, Hegeset said, “We’ll make sure that people are able to watch it, that it’s public, because people need to understand that…there’s serious consequences for these types of things.”
Can the Military Livestream It?
Apart from ethical questions, it might not be that easy to make the live execution available to people who might want to watch it.
For a start, it might require some changes to military regulations that are strict about witnesses, which are usually limited to official personnel, victim representatives, and media representatives.
And there’s another problem. Per The Verge, “YouTube, Meta, and Twitch won’t say if they’ll allow the US government to livestream an execution.”
Meanwhile, “Kick and TikTok say a livestream of an execution would violate their policies.”
Hasan’s legal team is also expected to challenge the execution protocols and the livestream proposal via the courts, per AP.
Unresolved Questions
Questions remain over whether military regulations allow the execution to be livestreamed and whether any legal challenges could prevent the broadcast.
The BBC cited former US Army sergeant Alonzo Lunsford, who was shot during the mass shooting, as saying, “I think the method is befitting for him because the lethal injection – that’s doing him a favor.”
He also mentioned the potential livestream, saying that it is “not something you should view for entertainment purposes.”
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