By Phil Stewart, Susan Heavey and Doina Chiacu
WASHINGTON, Oct 15 (Reuters) - US President Donald Trump scrapped plans to livestream the execution of the former Army major who killed 13 people at Fort Hood, overruling Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth on Thursday after the proposal drew opposition from Republicans, religious leaders and the public.
The reversal ended a plan to broadcast Nidal Hasan’s December 3 firing-squad execution. It also marked a rare public disagreement between Trump and one of the president’s closest allies, although the Pentagon said the two were “completely aligned.”
Hegseth had announced plans to livestream the execution at the Fort Hood military base in Texas, the site of Hasan’s 2009 attack. No other country is known to televise or livestream judicial executions.
Trump and his advisers had been unaware of the livestream plan, said a White House official speaking on condition of anonymity.
“I think streaming the execution for all to see might have been a strong deterrent for the World to witness how America deals with Terrorists and SCUM like Hasan but, many very good and well meaning people would rather not watch him die, through streaming, or through any other visual device,” Trump wrote in a social media post. “He will die, as scheduled, by firing squad, but this event will not be streamed.”
The families of Hasan’s victims will be able to view the execution in person if they so choose, as is standard at US executions.
Some of Trump’s fellow Republicans, including Vice President JD Vance, as well as religious leaders had expressed everything from doubts to outright condemnation of the Pentagon’s livestream plan.
Opinion polls showed a majority of Americans opposed livestreaming it. Archbishop Timothy Broglio, who oversees the spiritual care of Catholic members of the US armed forces, also raised objections, while Pope Leo condemned capital punishment in all its forms.
An attorney representing Hasan could not immediately be reached for comment, and it was unclear if the scheduled December 3 execution date would be delayed by legal challenges.
A SPLIT WITH HEGSETH
It was Trump’s first major public split with Hegseth, a Trump ally. But it was unclear whether the split would politically imperil Hegseth given their strong ties.
In a statement, the Pentagon said Trump spoke with Hegseth about the decision before announcing it on Truth Social.
“The Secretary supports the President’s decision, and they are completely aligned,” chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement.
Capital punishment in the US already was facing renewed scrutiny after Christa Pike, convicted of murder in the 1990s, survived two lethal injections in a failed execution attempt by Tennessee last month that left her badly injured and requiring hospitalization.
‘SERIOUS CONSEQUENCES’
A military jury convicted Hasan, a former US Army psychiatrist, of premeditated murder for fatally shooting 13 unarmed soldiers and wounding 32 others in a medical facility at the vast base. Law enforcement shot Hasan during his rampage, paralyzing him from the waist down, and he now uses a wheelchair.
Hegseth had said the broadcasting of the execution was needed to ensure that people understand that “there’s serious consequences for these types of things.”
Midterm elections on November 3 will determine whether Republicans retain control of Congress as voters increasingly register disapproval of Trump’s policies in opinion polls.
Senator John Curtis, a Republican representing Utah, called the cancellation “the right move” in a statement.
US Representative Richard Neal, a Democrat from Massachusetts, called the original plan “a profound failure of moral judgment and basic human decency.”
(Reporting by Phil Stewart, Susan Heavey and Doina Chiacu; Additional reporting by Jonathan Allen, Nandita Bose, Bo Erickson, David Morgan and Katharine Jackson; Editing by Scott Malone, Mark Porter and Howard Goller)
