Trump degrades military justice by weighing a Hasan livestream
By Adele Rutherford · Reporting from Atlanta ·
President Donald Trump is considering a public broadcast of Nidal Hasan's execution, a move that replaces the sobriety of military justice with the cheapness of a media spectacle.
President Donald Trump is treating the United States military justice system like a cable news segment. By weighing whether to livestream the execution of Nidal Hasan, the president is not seeking justice. He is seeking an audience. The death penalty is a legal holding, not a performance. When the executive branch turns a judicial sentence into a public event, it does not deter crime. It only degrades the legitimacy of the process.
The performance of the penalty
The facts of the case are settled. During the 2009 Fort Hood shooting, former Army Major Nidal Hasan killed 13 people. He wounded 32 others. This act of violence established the legal basis for his sentence.
The process has now entered a chaotic phase. According to NBC News, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced that the execution would be livestreamed. President Trump initially approved the plan. By Saturday, October 10, he told reporters he had not made a final decision. He framed the choice as a matter of deterrence. He suggested that showing the execution might stop others from doing what Hasan did.
This is the strongest case for a public broadcast. The argument is that the visibility of the penalty serves as a warning. But deterrence is a policy goal, not a legal procedure. In a court of law, the penalty is the punishment. It is not a marketing tool for the state. When the president says he will "make a decision" on the broadcast, he is admitting that the livestream is a political choice, not a military necessity.
The cost to the corps
The military is not a movie set. An execution by firing squad is a grim, professional duty. It is the first time the Army has used this method since 1945. CNN reports that Army officials were caught off guard by Secretary Hegseth's order. An Army officer told the network that allowing troops in uniform to shoot a man in a wheelchair for a global audience causes "irreparable" generational harm.
The record shows that Nidal Hasan is immobile and uses a wheelchair. The Army's existing regulations for witnesses are narrow. They include the family of the prisoner, the family of the victims, media representatives, and a chaplain. Expanding this to a global livestream is not a change in transparency. It is a change in kind.
The administration's internal contradictions are as stark as the proposed event. Vice President JD Vance stated he was unsure if the broadcast would happen. He added that he would not watch it. This distance is telling. The man who cast the tie-breaking vote in the Senate to confirm Pete Hegseth as Secretary of Defense is now distancing himself from Hegseth's most provocative idea. It is a failure of vetting that has now become a failure of leadership.
The architecture of the spectacle
The push for a public killing is not a new impulse, but it is a dangerous one. This is the same mechanism at work as the execution of Henry Wirz. Wirz was a medical officer executed by the military for war crimes against soldiers. In both cases, the state used the military's unique authority to punish a medical professional. But the goal of the military justice system is to maintain discipline and the rule of law. It is not to provide entertainment.
The bipartisan pushback reflects this. Representative Austin Scott of Georgia noted that livestreaming executions is "what jihadists do." Representative Rob Bresnahan of Pennsylvania argued that the focus should be on the victims, not a "public show." These are not objections based on sentiment. They are objections based on the dignity of the office.
The international reaction is equally clear. Pope Leo XIV called the death penalty an attack on human dignity. The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights stated that public executions are cruel and inhuman. They warned that livestreaming such an event can be a form of torture. While the president may dismiss these as foreign critiques, they highlight the gap between American legal tradition and the proposed spectacle.
The administration is attempting to use the death penalty to signal strength. But true strength in a legal system comes from the passive virtues. It comes from the boring, predictable application of the law. When the process is subsumed by the personality of the leader, the law ceases to be a rule and becomes a whim.
The Department of Defense will likely walk back this plan. They will cite security hurdles or logistical failures. They will move the broadcast to a closed circuit for the victims' families. This will happen because the institutional cost of a public livestream is too high. The Army cannot risk the morale of the soldiers tasked with the firing squad for the sake of a viral moment. The administration has mistaken a judicial conclusion for a political opportunity. In doing so, they have reminded us that they value the score more than the process.
Sources
- NBC News: Trump says he’ll decide whether to livestream the execution of Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan
- CNN: Army caught off guard by Hegseth’s order to make firing squad execution public
- The Washington Post: Pope criticizes death penalty after Hegseth announces public execution
- ABC Color: Trump dice que él decidirá si se transmite en directo la ejecución del militar
- Infobae: Trump dice que él decidirá si se transmite en directo la ejecución de un exmilitar