U.S. President Donald Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth speak to reporters aboard Air Force One flight from Dover, Delaware, to Miami, Florida, March 7, 2026.
Kevin Lamarque | Reuters
The Pentagon announced Monday night that President Donald Trump has approved Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s recommendation that Fort Hood mass murderer Nidal Hassan be executed by a U.S. military firing squad.
Hasan, 56, will be the first person to be executed after being court-martialed in the U.S. military since 1961, when he was an Army private first class. John Bennett was hanged at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, for the rape and attempted murder of a young girl in Austria.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment from CNBC.
Hasan, a psychiatrist, was convicted and sentenced to death by a 2013 court-martial for the Nov. 5, 2009, shooting at an Army base in Killeen, Texas, that killed 13 people and injured 32 others.
During his court martial, Hasan told the judge that his motive for the shooting was to protect “the Taliban, the leaders of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.”
Hegseth said in September 2025 that he asked President Trump to approve Hasan’s execution.
According to federal law, a person convicted by a military court and sentenced to death cannot be executed until approved by the president.
Nidal Hasan, who is accused of killing 13 people and injuring 31 others during the November 2009 mass shooting at Fort Hood, Texas, is shown in an undated Bell County Sheriff’s Office photo.
Bell County Sheriff’s Office | Reuters
“Secretary of the Army Pete Hegseth recommended, and President Donald J. Trump approved, the death penalty by U.S. military firing squad for Nidal Malik Hassan, a jihadist and convicted terrorist who fired on unarmed American soldiers at Fort Hood in 2009,” Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a post on X on Monday.
“He killed 13 people and injured 32 while shouting ‘Allah Akbar’ during the attack,” Parnell said.
The spokesman also said the army chief “will set the time and place of the execution.”
“Judgment day for Hasan has finally come,” Parnell wrote.
Hegseth retweeted Parnell’s post and wrote, “Justice.”
On March 31, 2025, the Supreme Court rejected Hasan’s petition to hear his appeal against his conviction, paving the way for his execution.
In September 2025, Hegseth told The Hill in a statement, “I am 100 percent committed to ensuring Nidal Hassan’s execution.”
“This brutal terrorist deserves the harshest legal punishment for the 2009 Fort Hood shooting,” Hegseth said at the time. “The victims and survivors deserve justice without delay.”
According to the Death Penalty Information Center, Hassan is one of only four people currently on death row as a result of a U.S. court-martial.
