Some G.O.P. Lawmakers Pan Hegseth’s Plan to Stream Execution of Fort Hood Shooter
New York Times · LC · trust 30/100
Some G.O.P. members of Congress said that broadcasting the execution of the Fort Hood shooter was inappropriate, though others gleefully applauded it.
Listen · 5:43 min Share full article The execution would be the military’s first since 1961. Credit... Nicole Bengiveno/The New York Times By Robert Jimison
”I absolutely support the sentence of death, but live-streaming executions is what jihadists do,” Representative Austin Scott, Republican of Georgia, wrote on social media on Friday morning. “America is better than that.”
Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina, a Republican who is retiring and increasingly critical of President Trump and his administration, said the decision was “beyond disgusting.” He likened it to the actions of some of the United States’ most brutal adversaries.
“Public executions are what oppressive dictatorships like Iran and Afghanistan do. It should not be happening in America,” he wrote in a social media post.
The criticism came after an announcement by the Pentagon that it would broadcast the execution of Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan , a former Army psychiatrist who killed 13 people and wounded 32 others in a shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Texas, in 2009. The execution is to be carried out on Dec. 3 by the military’s first firing squad since World War II, and would be its first execution by any method since 1961.
The decision came at a particularly fraught moment for congressional Republicans, who are fighting to preserve their narrow majorities in both chambers just weeks before the midterm elections. Already burdened by voter discontent over the war with Iran and a string of controversies involving Mr. Hegseth, G.O.P. lawmakers have been struggling to distance themselves from his bellicose stance.
We are having trouble retrieving the article content.
Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access.
Read the original at New York Times →
Open in TruthVane →