Trump Orders Historic Live-Broadcast Firing Squad Execution for Fort Hood Gunman Nidal Hasan

The execution of the former US Army psychiatrist who killed 13 people at Fort Hood, Texas, in 2009 will be carried out by firing squad and broadcast live. Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth announced on Human Events Daily with Jack Posobiec that the execution of Nidal Hasan is scheduled for December 3 at Fort Hood.

“We'll make sure that people are able to watch it, that it's public,” Mr Hegseth stated, emphasizing that the public needs to understand the serious consequences of such actions. The last public execution in the United States took place in 1936. US President Donald Trump ordered the use of a firing squad to execute Hasan.

Hasan, a former US Army major, previously described his 2009 shooting spree as retaliation for US wars in the Muslim world. Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell confirmed on X that putting Hasan to death by Army firing squad was approved by Mr Trump following a recommendation from Mr Hegseth. Mr Parnell noted that Hasan shouted “Allahu Akbar” during the assault, which left 12 unarmed active-duty soldiers and a retired serviceman dead, alongside 32 others wounded.

The Secretary of the Army will determine the time and place of the execution, according to Mr Parnell, who remarked that “Judgment day for Hasan has finally come.” Death by firing squad was recently added by the Trump administration as a permissible form of execution for grave federal crimes, alongside electrocution and gas asphyxiation, amid ongoing difficulties in obtaining lethal injection drugs.

A military jury sentenced Hasan to death in August 2013 after finding him guilty of 45 counts of premeditated murder and attempted premeditated murder for opening fire with a laser-sighted handgun at a medical centre on the Texas military base. Now 56 years old, Hasan was scheduled to deploy to Afghanistan weeks after the shooting and was left partially paralysed in a wheelchair after being shot by police during his arrest.

In response to the decision, the anti-capital punishment group Death Penalty Action stated, “There is nothing Donald Trump loves more than the power to kill.” Military executions remain rare, and under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, a death sentence from a court-martial requires presidential approval. If carried out, it would mark the first military execution since 1961, which was conducted by hanging. The last known execution by a US military firing squad occurred in November 1945.