WASHINGTON: The United States plans to livestream the execution of former army psychiatrist Nidal Hasan, who killed 13 people and wounded 31 others in a 2009 shooting at Fort Hood military base in Texas, the Pentagon said, in what would be an unprecedented broadcast of a US execution.
Hasan, 56, is scheduled to be executed by firing squad on December 3 at Fort Hood, where he opened fire inside a medical facility in November 2009.
He would be the first person executed by firing squad by the US military since 1945.
“It will be livestreamed. Details will follow,” a Pentagon official said on condition of anonymity. US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth, who advocated executing Hasan by firing squad, confirmed the livestream plans in a post on X.
Correct.
— Pete Hegseth (@PeteHegseth) October 8, 2026
Hegseth said the execution would take place at approximately 1 pm on a Thursday, matching the approximate time and day of the week of the 2009 shooting. He described the decision to use the same location and timing as a “no-brainer”.
“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,” Hegseth said in an interview with the Human Events Daily programme.
Asked whether Hasan had made any final requests, Hegseth replied: “Don’t care. We’ll see him on December 3.”
President approved execution
A military jury sentenced Hasan to death in August 2013 after finding him guilty of 45 counts of premeditated murder and attempted premeditated murder.
The shooting occurred weeks before Hasan was due to deploy to Afghanistan. He was left partially paralysed and confined to a wheelchair after being shot by police during his arrest.
Under US military law, the president must approve an execution by firing squad. President Donald Trump authorised the execution on the recommendation of Hegseth, the Pentagon said on Monday.
The White House declined to say whether Trump supported the livestream, referring questions to the Pentagon.
Unprecedented public broadcast
Media organisations have previously sought permission to televise US executions but have been blocked by courts. Experts said no other country was known to televise or livestream a legal execution.
Public executions have become exceedingly rare worldwide, although countries including Iran and Taliban-run Afghanistan have conducted them in recent years.
The last legally sanctioned public execution in the United States took place in 1936, when thousands watched the hanging of a young Black man convicted of raping a white woman, according to death penalty experts.
Eugene Fidell, a lawyer, author and military law expert who lectures at Yale Law School, said livestreaming Hasan’s execution would be highly unusual. He said Hasan would need to bring a federal court challenge to seek to block a public broadcast.
Jonathan Lurie, an author and historian of military justice, questioned the rationale for making the execution public, saying there were no compelling reasons to do so.
Firing squad returns to US executions
The group Death Penalty Action, which opposes capital punishment, said Hasan’s execution would be the first military execution since 1961. The Death Penalty Information Centre said the 1961 execution was carried out by hanging, while the last known executions by US military firing squads took place in 1945.
At least five US states have firing squads among their authorised execution methods. South Carolina carried out the first firing squad execution in the country in 15 years in 2025.
READ ALSO: Texas Executes Death Row Inmate After Botched Tennessee Execution
The Trump administration has also expanded the permissible methods of execution for the gravest federal crimes to include firing squads, electrocution and gas asphyxiation, partly in response to growing difficulties in obtaining drugs for lethal injections.
Can lethal injection truly meet constitutional and humane standards, or do repeated failures expose serious flaws in the process?
Supporters and opponents of the death penalty remain divided, but the key question is whether the state can carry it out while meeting both legal ! https://t.co/XNiwW1z0Mw
— R A (@Itsam4d) October 9, 2026
The plans come amid renewed scrutiny of lethal injection procedures after a botched execution attempt in Tennessee last week left death-row inmate Christa Pike alive but hospitalised. Her lawyers said on Wednesday that she had awoken “angry and confused” and remained seriously ill and shackled to her hospital bed.
Who Is Nidal Hasan?
Nidal Hasan is a former US Army psychiatrist born in the United States to Palestinian immigrant parents. He came to national attention on November 5, 2009, when he opened fire at Fort Hood, a US military base in Texas, killing 13 people and wounding 31 others.
Hasan, who was serving as an army major at the time, was convicted by a military court in 2013 on 45 counts of premeditated murder and attempted premeditated murder and sentenced to death. He was partially paralysed after being shot by police during his arrest and has remained in military custody while awaiting execution.
