The United States will livestream the Army's upcoming firing squad execution of Nidal Hasan, a Pentagon official says, in what would be an unprecedented move.

Nidal killed 13 people at Fort Hood in Texas in a 2009 shooting spree, also wounding 32 others.

On December 3, the former Army psychiatrist is set to become the first person to be executed by firing squad by the military since 1945.

The Pentagon official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity on Thursday, did not offer more information and said details would follow.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth earlier told the Human Events Daily podcast he planned to make Hasan's execution public, according to video of his comments posted on social media on Thursday.

Hegseth said deciding to execute Hasan by firing squad at Fort Hood on a Thursday at 1pm (local time) - the approximate time, day of the week and location of Hasan's shooting - was a "no-brainer."

"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," he said.

Asked if Hasan had made any final requests, Hegseth said: "Don't care. We'll see him on December 3."

A military jury sentenced Hasan to death in August 2013, after finding him guilty of 45 counts of premeditated murder and attempted premeditated murder for opening fire with a laser-sighted handgun in a medical facility at the sprawling central Texas military base.

 

The shooting came weeks before Hasan, now 56, was scheduled to be deployed to Afghanistan. He was left partially paralysed and confined to a wheelchair from being shot by police during his arrest.

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. Photo: Anadolu via Getty Images

Under US military law, a US President must approve an execution by firing squad. President Donald Trump did so on Hegseth's recommendation, the Pentagon disclosed on Monday.

"It hasn't been since World War Two since we've done that. Well, kind of like the mentality we had in World War Two," Hegseth said.

The group Death Penalty Action, which opposes capital punishment, said Hasan's execution would be the first military execution since 1961.

According to the Death Penalty Information Center, the 1961 execution was carried out by hanging.

The last known executions by US military firing squads were in 1945, the centre reported.

At least five states have firing squads on the books, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

In 2025, South Carolina carried out the first such execution in the US in 15 years.

TENNESSEE SUSPENDS EXECUTIONS

It comes as the state of Tennessee halts planned executions for the rest of the year following a botched attempt to put convicted murderer Christa Pike to death.

A week ago, Pike was taken from the execution chamber to a Nashville hospital unconscious, critically ill and with severe arm injuries after two injections of the caustic barbiturate pentobarbital failed to kill her at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution.

The 50-year-old is awake and speaking in hospital where she remains, albeit very sick, shackled to her bed and facing a long road to recovery, her lawyers said.

She is the first person known to have survived a "completed execution attempt" in the US, her lawyers say, calling it a violation of the Constitution's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishments.

They want the state to commute her sentence to life in prison.