Trump reportedly rethinking livestream of Fort Hood shooter’s execution
Pressure has been mounting as many, including the archbishop of Catholics in the U.S. military, speak out against the Pentagon’s plan to livestream the execution scheduled for December.
President Donald Trump is reportedly reconsidering the widely criticized public broadcasting of the execution of Nidal Hasan, days after the Pentagon announced the plan to livestream it.
Citing four people who have reportedly spoken with Trump, Axios reported Oct. 12 that the President has expressed “misgivings” about the plan in private.
According to Newsmax, Trump reportedly told a confidant outside the administration that the livestream “might not happen,” Axios reported.
The source added that Trump “didn’t sound particularly enthusiastic.”
The plan to livestream it has drawn criticism from a number of Republicans, including Georgia Rep. Austin Scott.
“Livestreaming executions is what jihadists do,” he said, according to Newsmax. “America is better than that.”
On Oct. 10, Trump indicated that the decision remains up in the air.
“Well, you have two thoughts,” Trump told reporters outside the White House. “He’s a vicious killer, killed 13 people in cold blood, wounded over 20. Some of those people will never have their lives back in a true sense. He was vicious, he was violent. There are two thoughts. Don’t show it and show it. ‘Cause you know, by showing it, maybe other people won’t be doing what he did. So I’ll make a decision ultimately. I know what the military would like to do, but we’ll make a decision.”
Fox News reported that the U.S. military has not executed a prisoner since 1961 or executed a person by firing squad since 1945. Hasan is a former Army major convicted of killing 13 people and wounding 32 others in a shooting at Fort Hood, Texas, in 2009, as Zeale News reported. His execution is scheduled for Dec. 3 at Fort Hood. The Department of War announced the plan to livestream the execution, a decision Archbishop Paul Coakley, president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, condemned Oct. 9.
Archbishop Coakley said he learned of the decision “with shock and great sorrow,” emphasizing that a public execution bears grave consequences for the country.
“Our God is the God of life. In no way can Hassan’s actions be condoned, but this decision is a barbaric promotion of a culture of death and must be reconsidered,” he said.
Such a livestream “will only further undermine the moral fabric of our nation and be a blight on the conscience of its people,” he later added, calling for prayers for the intercession of Our Lady of Good Counsel.
On Oct. 10, Pope Leo XIV’s X account highlighted the Pontiff’s words declaring the death penalty as “inadmissible, because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person.” Vatican News noted that Oct. 10 is World Day Against the Death Penalty, Zeale News reported.
The Most Rev. Timothy Broglio, archbishop for the Military Services, USA, issued a statement Oct. 12 urging reconsideration of the decision to livestream the execution. He also obliged any Catholic assigned to the firing squad to request a religious exemption from carrying out the action, which he said is contrary to Church teaching.
He later added that the U.S. military in general has a good reputation, continuing, “Is there really a value to throwing them in the same boat with terrorists by broadcasting the image of the execution of a man in a wheel chair to the whole world? Does this decision reflect the dignity of the human person?”
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