Vance casts doubt on Pentagon plan to livestream Fort Hood execution

Vice President JD Vance cast doubt on Friday over whether the Pentagon will actually livestream the firing squad execution of Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan, and told reporters he would not watch the broadcast if it goes ahead.

"I don't know that that's actually going to happen," Vance told reporters in Hebron, Kentucky, before departing for a rally in Lima, Ohio. "If it's ultimately livestreamed, I'm not gonna be watching it."

Vance, a convert to the Catholic Church, spoke as the controversy grew over the plan championed by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. The head of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops condemned the livestream plan as "barbaric" on Friday morning, and former U.S. officials warned that broadcasting an execution would hand terrorists a recruiting tool.

Hegseth announced in an October 8 interview that Hasan, the former Army psychiatrist convicted of killing 13 people and wounding 32 others in the November 5, 2009 shooting at Fort Hood, Texas, will be executed by firing squad on December 3 at the base, and that the execution will be made public. Death penalty experts said it would mark the first known broadcast of a lawful execution. It would be the first U.S. military firing squad execution since January 31, 1945, when Pvt. Eddie Slovik was executed for desertion.

President Donald Trump backed the plan on Friday, saying Hasan is "a maniac" and that the firing squad is deserved. "Absolutely, I approved," Trump said of the livestream, adding, "I really don't care how he goes, so long as he goes." But Trump also said the Pentagon was still making a final determination on the broadcast, stopping short of committing to it.

Vance tried to set the controversy aside and keep focus on the crimes. "I hope that people don't forget that this is a guy who brutally murdered a lot of innocent people," he said. Hasan shouted "Allahu Akbar" as he fired on fellow soldiers with a laser sighted handgun, later saying he meant to stop U.S. forces from going to Afghanistan to kill his fellow Muslims. He was convicted of 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted premeditated murder in a 2013 court martial.