Vice President JD Vance said Friday that he will not be watching the Pentagon’s planned livestream of the firing squad execution of Fort Hood killer Nidal Hasan, while urging Americans not to lose sight of the brutal crimes that led to the death sentence.
The comments came one day after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced his intention to make Hasan’s December 3rd execution public. Speaking to Real America’s Voice on Thursday, Hegseth said, “We’ll make sure that people are able to watch it, that it’s public.” The Pentagon then confirmed that it will livestream the execution.
The plan, the first of its kind to broadcast an execution inside the United States, has drawn condemnation from both Republicans and Democrats. If it moves forward, the firing squad execution would also mark the first U.S. military execution since 1961, and the first carried out by military firing squad since 1945.
During a gaggle with reporters Friday, Vance was asked about Hegseth’s announcement.
“Well, first of all, I’ve seen these announcements. I don’t know that that’s actually going to happen. Let’s sort of see what — I think it’s going to happen in December when he’s executed,” Vance said.
The vice president then turned the focus to Hasan’s victims and the scale of the attack.
“But what I try to remind people is, look, this is a guy who committed, in my view, the worst terrorist attack on American soil outside of 9/11,” Vance said. “The people that he was meant to treat, the army soldiers that he was meant to treat for mental illness and other problems, he took them at their most vulnerable and gunned down these people where they live.”
Vance stressed that the debate over how Hasan will be put to death should not overshadow what he did.
“So whatever the controversy is about the method of the execution, I hope that people don’t forget that this is a guy who brutally murdered a lot of innocent people,” he said.
Still, the vice president made clear he has no plans to tune in.
“Now, that said, I mean, look, if it’s all through livestream, I’m not going to be watching it,” Vance said.
Hasan, a former U.S. Army major and psychiatrist, carried out a mass shooting in 2009 at a crowded Readiness Center at the Fort Hood military base in Texas. The attack left 12 soldiers, one civilian and an unborn baby dead, and wounded 32 others.
Hasan was shot by military police during the attack and was left paralyzed from the waist down. He is confined to a wheelchair.
The livestream announcement has set off a firestorm across the political spectrum, with critics from both parties pushing back on the idea of broadcasting an execution to the public. Hegseth, however, has signaled the Pentagon intends to move ahead, and the department has confirmed the livestream plan.
Vance, for his part, cast doubt on whether the broadcast will ultimately take place, but left no doubt about his view of the man at the center of it: a killer who targeted the very soldiers he was entrusted to help.
The execution is scheduled for December 3rd.
