The Army has set an execution date for Nidal Malik Hasan, the Muslim terrorist convicted of killing 13 people and hurting 32 others in the 2009 Fort Hood massacre.
Hasan is scheduled to die by firing squad on December 3 at Fort Hood, Texas, in what would be the first U.S. military execution since 1961. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth recommended the execution method, and President Donald Trump approved it, the Pentagon announced Monday.
“Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has recommended — and President Donald J. Trump has approved — death by U.S. Army firing squad for convicted terrorist Nidal Malik Hasan,” Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement.
A military jury convicted Hasan, a former Army psychiatrist, in 2013 of killing 13 people and wounding 32 others in the November 2009 attack at Fort Hood. Witnesses testified that he shouted “Allahu Akbar” before opening fire. He later told the court that he had “switched sides” and was acting in defense of Muslims. Hasan also wanted to deter the U.S. military from operating in Afghanistan, according to the Associated Press. The attack marked the deadliest mass shooting at an American military base.
Trump’s stamp of approval follows a pledge from Hegseth, who said in September 2025 that he was committed to carrying out Hasan’s death sentence.
“I am 100% committed to ensuring the death penalty is carried out for Nidal Hasan,” Hegseth previously said. “The victims and survivors deserve justice without delays.”
In a one-word post Monday, Hegseth said: “Justice.”
The military has not executed a service member since 1961, when the Army executed John Bennett for the rape and attempted murder of an 11-year-old girl in Austria, according to ABC News.
Three other men are waiting to die on the military’s death row at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. President George W. Bush approved the execution of Army Spc. Ronald Gray in 2008, but a judge hit the brakes. Gray remains at Leavenworth, the Associated Press reported. Hasan still has options to delay the December execution, including a possible habeas corpus appeal in the civilian federal court system, according to an article published in May in the magazine Army Lawyer.
In April, Trump’s Department of Justice directed the Bureau of Prisons to bring back the firing squad and lethal injection for federal executions.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche announced a series of new measures to strengthen enforcement of the federal death penalty, clearing the way for the DOJ to carry out executions once inmates exhaust their appeals.
“Among the actions taken are readopting the lethal injection protocol utilized during the first Trump Administration, expanding the protocol to include additional manners of execution such as the firing squad, and streamlining internal processes to expedite death penalty cases,” the Justice Department said in a press release.
The directives fulfilled a campaign promise for Trump, who on his first day back in office issued an order to “pursue the death penalty for all crimes of a severity demanding its use” and marked a reversal from the Biden administration’s handling of federal executions.
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