War Secretary Pete Hegseth says the Fort Hood shooter’s firing squad execution will be public and livestreamed Dec. 3, giving Americans a clear look at justice for the 2009 massacre.
The Pentagon confirmed the planned livestream after Hegseth stated the death of Nidal Malik Hasan must be seen so the public understands the cost of mass murder on a U.S. base. Hasan, the Army psychiatrist who killed 13 and wounded 32 at Fort Hood in 2009, is set to face a firing squad at the same Texas post on Dec. 3.
President Donald Trump has approved the sentence, according to Pentagon statements on the approved execution, marking the first U.S. military execution since 1961 and the first by firing squad since World War II.
Newsmax reported that Hegseth spoke aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln and left little doubt about the schedule or the tone.
Hegseth told Real America’s Voice News the execution would be watchable.
"We’ll make sure that people are able to watch it, that it’s public,"
he said. Asked about any final requests or outreach from Hasan, Hegseth answered flatly.
"Don’t care. We’ll see him on Dec. 3."
Pentagon officials clarified the next day that the event will be livestreamed, with more details to follow. The White House immediately pointed questions back to the Pentagon.
Hasan walked into a medical building at Fort Hood in 2009 where soldiers waited for shots and clearance before deploying. He shouted “Allahu akbar,” opened fire with a laser-sighted handgun, and kept shooting as troops fled. Investigators recovered 146 shell casings inside the building and dozens more outside.
He had spent weeks preparing. He videotaped a sales clerk changing a magazine and practiced rapid reloads at a gun range outside Austin. At trial he largely refused to put on a defense, acted as his own lawyer, and described himself as a soldier who had “switched sides.” A military judge blocked him from turning his claimed motive, stopping deployments to Afghanistan, into a legal defense. He was convicted.
A Fox News account quoted a War Department official confirming the broadcast plan in plain terms: “It will be livestreamed. Details will follow.” Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell added, “Judgment day for Hasan has finally come.”
That long wait is why the case still lands hard with families and veterans who watched the original attack and then watched the appeals grind on. The last military execution was the hanging of Army Pvt. John Bennett on April 13, 1961. No servicemember has been put to death by firing squad since the 1940s.
Breitbart reported Trump’s own blunt assessment of the outcome. “They are making a determination about that, but he will be killed,” the president said of any public-broadcast decision. “I really don’t care how he goes, as long as he goes.” Vice President JD Vance said that if the execution airs live, “I’m not going to be watching it.”
Hegseth framed the public element as a deterrent message rather than spectacle. The New York Post carried his fuller point: people need to see that “there’s serious consequences for these types of things.”
The scheduled date sits at Fort Hood itself, the same ground where the victims fell. Military authorities have not yet released the exact livestream platform or viewing rules, only that the execution will be carried out by firing squad and that further information is coming.
Capital cases elsewhere have drawn fresh attention this year, from Florida’s rare double execution to pauses after troubled lethal-injection attempts. Hasan’s case stands apart because it is a court-martial sentence finally moving under presidential approval after more than a decade and a half.
Yale Law School visiting lecturer Eugene R. Fidell, who specializes in military law, noted that Hasan could still try to fight the date in civilian court.
"It frankly might outlast the current administration, and who knows if the next one will have the same penchant for executions,"
Fidell said, pointing to the chance of a habeas petition that could stretch the timeline.
No such filing is described as already on the docket in the available accounts. For now the calendar remains Dec. 3, the method remains the firing squad, and the Pentagon’s position is that the public will be able to see it.
The 2009 attack was not random workplace violence. Hasan planned it, practiced for it, declared his switch of allegiance, and targeted soldiers preparing to deploy. Thirteen families never got those service members home. Thirty-two more carry the wounds.
After years of process, the sentence Trump approved is moving toward the same base where the shooting happened. The Dec. 3 firing-squad date at Fort Hood is the concrete next step.
When a terrorist in uniform murders his fellow troops on American soil, justice delayed is still justice owed, and the country is entitled to see it carried out without apology.