Trump signals execution livestream may not happen as backlash grows

Would be first public execution in 90 years

'Trump administration may have misread public mood'

US President Donald Trump speaks to reporters upon arriving at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on Saturday (local time). [AP]

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US President Donald Trump has privately signaled he may oppose the live broadcast of a Muslim terrorist's execution as a wave of criticism over the plan intensified, the American online outlet Axios reported Monday (local time).

According to the report, Trump told a close associate that the livestream "may not happen," as condemnation of the plan spread across both the Democratic and Republican parties. Axios noted, however, that the associate is not an administration official.

Trump did not appear to be particularly enthusiastic about the livestream, and "that is why he is calling around and asking people what they think," the associate said.

Another associate who said they had spoken with Trump said the president "wants Hassan to pay the price" — referring to death-row inmate Nidal Hasan — but "at the same time does not want to make Hassan a martyr."

Nidal Malik Hasan, a Muslim US Army soldier who opened fire at Fort Hood in 2009, killing 13 people. [Reuters]

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Friday that the execution of Nidal Malik Hasan — a Muslim US Army soldier who killed 13 people in a 2009 shooting rampage — would be made public, saying "we will let people watch it."

Trump approved the execution earlier this month, and it is scheduled for December.

Hegseth's remarks immediately drew concern from across American society, with critics arguing that broadcasting an execution is not only inhumane but could also inflame Islamic extremists.

Axios said Trump has been subtly shifting his position since Hegseth made the comments.

On Friday, the day Hegseth spoke, Trump told reporters at the White House that he was "all for it." But in an interview released later that night, he said he was "not involved in that decision, but I understand it." By Saturday, Trump was acknowledging that livestreaming the execution was a matter of debate, while asserting that "the final decision will be mine" — signaling he intended to keep control of the situation.

Hasan was found to have carried out a "homegrown" terrorist attack after suffering severe psychological stress ahead of a deployment to Afghanistan. The massacre was recorded as the deadliest terrorist attack on US soil since the Sept. 11 attacks.

If Hasan's execution is made public as Hegseth announced, it would be the first public execution in the United States in roughly 90 years — since Rainey Bethea, a Black man convicted of raping a white woman, was hanged publicly in Kentucky in 1936.

BBC reported Sunday that recent research suggests Hegseth and the Trump administration may have misread the current mood in the United States, citing a survey by the University of California, Berkeley, which found that Americans' appetite for violence has been declining.

yckim6452@heraldcorp.com