Trump sows doubt on plan to livestream US military execution as backlash grows

President Trump expressed uncertainty about livestreaming the execution of Nidal Hasan, scheduled for December 3rd, despite supporting the death penalty for him.

Many officials, including Senator Mark Kelly and Representative Austin Scott, opposed the livestream, comparing it to practices by groups like the Taliban.

Tech firms, TikTok's policy, and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights condemned the idea, with the latter stating it violates the prohibition of torture.

WASHINGTON, Oct 10 — US President Donald Trump cast doubt yesterday on whether authorities will livestream the firing squad execution of the perpetrator of a deadly attack on American soldiers, a plan that has drawn broad and bipartisan condemnation.

Nidal Hasan’s execution — scheduled for December 3 at Fort Hood, Texas, where he gunned down 13 people in 2009 — is set to be the first by a US military firing squad since 1945.

A Pentagon official told AFP on Thursday that the execution would be streamed live, after US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said “we’ll make sure that people are able to watch it, that it’s public.”

But Trump, who supports the death penalty in this case, left uncertain whether the execution would be publicly broadcast.

“They are making a determination about that, but he will be killed,” Trump said. “I really don’t care how he goes, as long as he goes.”

Earlier yesterday, Vice President JD Vance told journalists who asked about the planned livestream that he does not “know that that’s actually going to happen.”

“This is a guy who committed, in my view, the worst terrorist attack on American soil outside of 9/11,” Vance said, but added that if the execution is broadcast live, “I’m not going to be watching it.”

Representative Austin Scott of Trump’s Republican Party said he supported executing Hasan but “livestreaming executions is what jihadists do. America is better than that.”

Senator Mark Kelly, a Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said Hasan should “face justice” but that public executions are “the kind of thing Iran and the Taliban do. Is this who we want to be associated with?”

Tech firms YouTube, Meta and X did not immediately respond to requests for comment on whether they would allow the execution to be streamed on their platforms.

TikTok directed AFP to its policy banning depictions of “graphic incidents and violence” including “the shooting of an individual.”

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights condemned the plan, saying in a message sent to AFP on Friday that “the livestreaming of an execution is tantamount to a public execution and would breach the absolute prohibition of torture.”

Archbishop Paul Coakley, president of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, said it was a “barbaric promotion of a culture of death and must be reconsidered.”

‘Compound the cruelty’

Hegseth said it would be the military’s first firing squad execution since World War II.

“People need to understand that...there’s serious consequence for these types of things,” Hegseth said in a video shared Thursday on official Pentagon X accounts.

The last US military execution was carried out in 1961, when John Bennett was hanged for rape and attempted murder.

The Death Penalty Information Center says 135 troops have been executed by the US military since 1916.

According to rights group Amnesty International, at least 17 public executions are known to have been carried out in 2025 — six in Afghanistan and 11 in Iran.

Amnesty’s Justin Mazzola said Friday that the death penalty is “a violation of human rights,” and that streaming Hasan’s execution “would only compound the cruelty.”

Twelve of the 13 people Hasan killed and 30 of those he wounded were soldiers. He was shot by a civilian police officer who responded to the attack and is paralyzed from the waist down.

Hasan chose to conduct his own defence during the trial but called no witnesses and gave no testimony, and made no attempt to deny the charges.

He was sentenced to death by a military jury in 2013.

Court-appointed defence attorneys expressed concern that he was seeking execution.

The court that convicted Hasan was told he was opposed to the US military’s occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan, and that he had spoken online with an alleged Al-Qaeda figure, radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, an American citizen subsequently killed in a US drone strike in Yemen. — AFP

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尽管支持对尼达尔·哈桑判处死刑，但特朗普总统对直播定于12月3日执行的死刑表示不确定。

包括参议员马克·凯利和众议员奥斯汀·斯科特在内的许多官员反对直播，将其与塔利班等组织的做法相提并论。

科技公司、TikTok 的政策以及联合国人权事务高级专员都谴责了这一想法，后者表示这违反了禁止酷刑的规定。

华盛顿，10 月 10 日——美国总统唐纳德·特朗普昨天对当局是否会直播枪决袭击美国士兵的凶手表示怀疑，这一计划遭到了广泛的两党谴责。

尼达尔·哈桑的死刑将于 12 月 3 日在德克萨斯州胡德堡执行，他于 2009 年在那里枪杀了 13 人。这将是自​​ 1945 年以来美国军方行刑队首次执行死刑。

五角大楼一名官员周四告诉法新社，此次处决将进行现场直播。此前，美国国防部长皮特·赫格塞斯表示，“我们将确保人们能够观看，确保它是公开的。”

但支持本案死刑的特朗普并未明确表示行刑过程是否会公开直播。

“他们正在对此做出决定，但他肯定会被杀，”特朗普说。“我真的不在乎他怎么死，只要他死就行。”

昨天早些时候，副总统 JD Vance 在被记者问及计划中的直播时表示，他“不知道这是否真的会发生”。

“在我看来，这个人犯下了除9/11事件之外在美国本土发生的最严重的恐怖袭击，”万斯说，但他补充说，如果行刑过程进行现场直播，“我不会看的。”

特朗普所属的共和党众议员奥斯汀·斯科特表示，他支持处决哈桑，但“直播处决是圣战分子才会做的事。美国不应该这样做。”

参议院军事委员会民主党参议员马克·凯利表示，哈桑应该“接受审判”，但公开处决是“伊朗和塔利班才会做的事。我们想和这样的人扯上关系吗？”

YouTube、Meta 和 X 这三家科技公司尚未立即回应有关是否允许在其平台上直播死刑执行的置评请求。

TikTok 向法新社指出，其政策禁止描绘“血腥事件和暴力”，包括“枪击个人”。

联合国人权事务高级专员谴责了这项计划，并在周五发给法新社的一份声明中表示，“直播处决等同于公开处决，将违反禁止酷刑的绝对禁令。”

美国天主教主教会议主席保罗·科克利大主教表示，这是“对死亡文化的野蛮宣扬，必须重新考虑”。

“加倍残忍”

赫格塞斯表示，这将是二战以来军方首次执行枪决。

“人们需要明白……这类事情会带来严重的后果，”赫格塞斯在周四五角大楼X官方账号分享的一段视频中说道。

美国最后一次执行军事处决是在 1961 年，当时约翰·贝内特因强奸和谋杀未遂被绞死。

死刑信息中心表示，自 1916 年以来，美国军方已处决了 135 名士兵。

据人权组织国际特赦组织称，2025 年已知至少有 17 人被公开处决——其中 6 人在阿富汗，11 人在伊朗。

大赦国际的贾斯汀·马佐拉周五表示，死刑是“对人权的侵犯”，直播哈桑的死刑“只会加剧残忍”。

哈桑杀害的13人中有12人是士兵，他打伤的30人中也有士兵。他被一名赶来应对袭击的平民警察击中，导致腰部以下瘫痪。

哈桑选择在审判期间为自己辩护，但他没有传唤证人，也没有作证，更没有试图否认指控。

2013年，他被军事陪审团判处死刑。

法院指定的辩护律师表示担忧，认为他是在寻求死刑。

判处哈桑有罪的法庭获悉，他反对美国对伊拉克和阿富汗的军事占领，并且曾与一名据称是基地组织成员的激进教士安瓦尔·奥拉基在网上交谈过。奥拉基是一名美国公民，后来在也门的一次美军无人机袭击中丧生。——法新社

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