Nidal Hasan murdered 13 people at Fort Hood in 2009. A military jury sentenced him to death, and almost nobody is arguing he doesn’t deserve it. Pete Hegseth still found a way to turn his execution into a stunt.
On Thursday, the defense secretary said Hasan would face “a firing squad of soldiers, and we’ll make sure that people are able to watch it,” NBC News reported. The Pentagon then said it would livestream the execution, set for 1 p.m. on December 3 at Fort Hood. The United States hasn’t held a public execution since 1936.
What did Hegseth say about Nidal Hasan’s execution?
Speaking from the USS Abraham Lincoln to Jack Posobiec on the right-wing network Real America’s Voice, Hegseth called a firing squad a “no-brainer.” “People need to understand that there’s serious consequences for these types of things,” he said. He picked the date and hour to match Hasan’s attack, CBS News reported. A Defense Department official later confirmed the livestream, without saying on what platform.
It would be the military’s first execution since 1961 and its first by firing squad since World War II. Army rules allow news media witnesses at an execution, but no U.S. execution has ever been broadcast live.
Why are Republicans and Democrats criticizing the livestream?
Because it crosses a line both parties still recognize. Republican Sen. Thom Tillis, who supports executing Hasan, called the broadcast “beyond disgusting.” “Public executions are what oppressive dictatorships like Iran and Afghanistan do. It should not be happening in America,” he wrote, The National Desk reported.
Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy, who also supports the death penalty, learned about the plan during a CNN interview. “That’s disgusting. What is he, mimicking ISIS executions?” he said. “Public hangings and executions, that’s what America has become?”
Why is Hegseth so unpopular?
The livestream fits a pattern. Hegseth has spent his tenure picking fights that play well on cable and badly everywhere else. In a speech at Quantico last week, he bragged about ending “silly PowerPoint trainings or drag queen shows” and “gender pronouns.” New York Times Pentagon reporter Greg Jaffe told NPR’s Fresh Air this week that Hegseth fired the Army’s top general, Randy George, in April “without cause or reason,” has disproportionately blocked promotions of Black and women senior officers, and is facing growing blowback on Capitol Hill, including from Republicans who won’t confirm his nominees.
The public has noticed. In a Marquette Law School poll last month, only 25% of Americans viewed Hegseth favorably and 49% unfavorably, his worst rating yet, Newsweek reported. Republican Rep. Thomas Massie announced articles of impeachment against him over the Iran war, which 79% in the same poll said hasn’t been worth the cost.
The BeezLoop Take
Justice for the 13 people Hasan killed means carrying out a lawful sentence with dignity, for their families, not as content. Streaming it turns the deaths of soldiers into a show for an audience Hegseth wants to impress, and turns the soldiers who’ll pull the triggers into props. The families waited 17 years. They deserve better than a livestream link.
Who is this for? Not the troops, who need a leader focused on a war that’s eight months old. Not allies, who watch the U.S. borrow a practice from the regimes it fights. It’s for the same audience Hegseth used to perform for on weekend Fox, and it’s why even senators in his own party are done pretending this is normal.
The open question: will any Republican who called this “disgusting” actually vote to stop it?
Also on BeezLoop: the Army will execute Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan by firing squad, Hegseth told Cyber Command to defend the midterms, and the accused men Trump has stood by, including Hegseth.
Sources: NBC News · CBS News · The National Desk via WGXA (Tillis, Murphy) · Al Jazeera · NPR Fresh Air (Greg Jaffe, New York Times) · Newsweek (Marquette poll) · CBS News (video)
