President Donald Trump said Thursday morning that the government will no longer
livestream the execution of Nidal Malik Hasan. The firing squad killing,
scheduled for December 3, will be the first such execution carried out by the
military since 1945.
“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 on
Truth Social.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said last week that the execution of Hasan, who
opened fire on dozens of people at a military installation in 2009, would be
publicly streamable. Since then, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin
has come out in support of the plan (“no one has to watch it” if they don’t want
to, Mullin said). The execution livestream’s supporters also include
weapons-tech titans such as Anduril’s Palmer Luckey, who wrote that to “revel in
the death of those who truly deserve it…is normal, good, and aligned with our
natural and national order.”
Eight in ten Americans, according to a poll released by ABC News today,
disagree. So do 72 retired US generals, who wrote a letter calling the idea of
an execution livestream “barbaric.” Parenting experts have voiced fears that
children might inadvertently witness a man’s death via YouTube autoplay or
memes.
Though Trump called off the Pentagon’s plan to broadcast the shooting, he was
clear that Hasan “will die as scheduled” on December 3rd.
The United States has executed 31 people in 2026 so far. It’s one of a few dozen
nations that have the death penalty on the books—most of which do not actually
carry out executions. According to Amnesty International, only 17 countries,
including the US, executed anyone in 2025.
“The execution may be viewed in person by the immediate families of the victims,
if they so choose,” Trump wrote on Thursday. “They deserve to witness JUSTICE!”
Tag - Death penalty
THE EXECUTION OF MARCELLUS WILLIAMS IS A SHOCKING EXAMPLE OF POWER DICTATING ITS
FATAL WHIMS TO THOSE SOCIETY DEEMS LESSER
~ Daniel Adediran ~
The case against Marcellus Khalifa Williams, given his last meal and executed in
Missouri on September 25, was riddled with miscarriages of justice, including a
complete lack of DNA evidence, two known unreliable witnesses who had reason to
lie to reduce their own sentences, and the personal interference of those with
their hands on the levers of power. This includes the new Governor and the
Attorney General, who after setbacks to the case, overturned legal precedent in
the state to hurry Williams to his death.
It is imperative that we take this case to heart. Marcellus was an unwitting
victim, but is also a shocking example of power dictating its fatal whims to
those society deems lesser.
In the eyes of those in power, justice has been served. But this is not even the
view of those who have actually suffered the repercussions of the horrific
slaying of Lisha Gayle, her family, who repeatedly said they didn’t want
Marcellus to be slain. Even the prosecutor filed a motion to overturn the trial.
Williams was convicted of the 1998 murder of Lisha Gayle, a young white woman.
The jury, in the deep south, consisted of eleven white people and one black
person. A recent study of St. Louis county’s disparities in death penalty
sentencing shows that the fatal sentence was three and a half times more likely
to be passed down for a white victim than for a black one. Marcellus’ fate was
sealed.
The justice system does not have justice as a major concern. It is concerned
with the dehumanisation and destruction of black bodies, as is every state
institution, particularly within the United States. A black man was killed in
the South, but not by a lone vigilante, a mob, or mere agents of the state, but
by the very instruments of the state set up allegedly to keep us safe.
If the gears of this so-called justice system can grind Marcellus to death under
these conditions without the assent, approval or even agreement of the aggrieved
parties, it becomes evident that this justice goes only toward entrenching power
for those who hold it above us. And it does so by playing out the same tropes
over centuries, that black bodies are dispensable, and can be summarily
sacrificed to quench their need for blood.
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