Execute Nidal Hasan by firing squad, but don’t make it must-see-TV

A government-ordered public execution hasn’t happened in the United States since Aug. 14, 1936. In that case, it was the hanging of Rainey Bethea in Owensboro, Kentucky, who was convicted of raping and killing a 70-year-old woman in her home.Ninety years later, another public execution is scheduled to take place on Dec. 3 in Fort Hood, Texas, at 1 p.m. CT. But this execution will be by firing squad of Major Nidal Hasan, the Army psychiatrist who killed 13 people and wounded 32 in a terrorist attack at Fort Hood in 2009. As far as the numbers regarding capital punishment in general go, 66% of U.S. adults favor the death penalty for murder, according to a survey from the nonpartisan Pew Research Center. When split down party lines, 84% of Republicans favor it, while a slight majority of Democrats, 51%, feel the same way.What makes this execution different is that it will be livestreamed for the world to witness. And this begs two questions:Will doing so send a clear and unambiguous message to our enemies that any attack on Americans, especially on U.S. soil, cannot and will not be tolerated?Or will it make a terrorist like Hasan a martyr?Among GOP circles, the feelings appear to be split. House Speaker Mike Johnson, for example, said it won’t be must-see-TV for him.“I wouldn’t be watching it if it was aired,” he told CBS News recently. “I need to tell the White House what some of my colleagues think about that and not everybody’s in favor of the idea.”“If it were me, I wouldn’t televise it or publicize it or whatever they’re doing,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) said while campaigning with Michigan Senate nominee Mike Rogers. “I just think it makes our society coarser, and I wouldn’t do it.”“We weigh the risk every single day in this country,” Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said regarding the risk of martyring Hasan. “That’s what we do, is we protect the homeland. But I don’t see an elevated risk at this point at all because of this: I think people need to understand if you attack America, we will come after you, and we will make sure that the punishment fits the crime, and in this case, he killed 13 individuals on Fort Hood. I have no sympathy for him, and I give absolutely zero thought to the way that this man dies.”“It’s going to be soldiers with rifles executing the firing squad,” the secretary of war explained in a recent interview. “And we’ll make sure that people are able to watch it, that it’s public, because people need to understand that there’s serious consequences for these types of things.”Vice President JD Vance has also weighed in by appearing to accept a firing squad as a means of execution, but also said he won’t be watching it.“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,” Vance said. “Now that said, I mean, look, if it’s ultimately livestreamed, I’m not gonna be watching it.”While the president has signed off on Hegseth’s method of execution, he has not approved or disapproved the livestreaming aspect.“There are two thoughts,” Trump told reporters last weekend. “Don’t show it and show it. Because, you know, by showing it, maybe other people won’t be doing what he did. So, I’ll make a decision, ultimately.”Ultimately, the decision should be to go ahead with using a firing squad, particularly in light of the botched execution of convicted murderer Christa Pike in Tennessee on Sept. 30 by lethal injection. Pike has since regained consciousness and begun walking this week. It is still unclear whether Tennessee officials will attempt to execute Pike again. Using a firing squad would be a guaranteed method of execution with zero chance of survival.Livestreaming the event, however, may only give Hasan, who has referred to himself as “a soldier of Islam,” the glory that he seeks. During his trial, he decided to defend himself by not defending his actions at all.“Witnesses will testify that war is an ugly thing,” he said at the time. “Death, destruction, and devastation are felt from both sides, from friend and foe. Evidence from this trial will only show one side. I was on the wrong side but I switched sides.”As he was gunning down U.S. service members at Fort Hood, Hasan repeatedly yelled “Allah Akbar.” It is almost virtually guaranteed the same words will be screamed before the firing squad pulls their triggers for everyone to hear.The result will be Islamic terrorists and their supporters taking advantage of the spectacle.It will be important for Trump to remember how repulsed we felt when, at the height of the Islamic State group during the Barack Obama years, the terrorist caliphate would carry out public executions of the public by livestreaming them on the internet. It was sick and medieval.The U.S. is the greatest country in human history. We shouldn’t reduce ourselves to mimicking the very things we once condemned.GOP OPPOSITION GROWS TO LIVESTREAMING EXECUTION OF FORT HOOD SHOOTERFiring squad for Hasan? Absolutely. Let him suffer the same fate as those 13 he killed and the 32 he wounded.But making him a sympathetic, heroic figure is something the commander in chief ultimately should avoid. My gut feeling here is that he ultimately will.