Emmer says he’s ‘so happy’ Trump will decide whether to stream public execution

House Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) on Sunday said he is “so happy” that President Trump will decide on whether to livestream the execution by firing squad of convicted Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan.

“I am so happy that we have a president, a chief executive in this country, who will make a decision which is in the best interest of the American people,” Emmer, who prefaced by saying he does not favor the death penalty, told ABC News’s Jonathan Karl on “This Week.”

“He will hold the criminals and the terrorists accountable,” Emmer continued. “And, frankly, if you come to this country or you’re radicalized in this country to kill Americans and disrupt our way of life, there should be significant consequences.”

Trump had said Saturday that he will “make a decision ultimately” about livestreaming the execution.

“There are two thoughts: Don’t show it and show it, because you know by showing it, maybe other people won’t be doing what he did,” Trump told reporters outside the White House. “So I’ll make a decision ultimately. I know what the military would like to do, but we’ll make a decision.”

Last week, a White House spokesperson confirmed that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth “recommended” Hasan’s execution be carried out by firing squad on Dec. 3, and the president “approved” it.

Hasan, a former Army psychiatrist, opened fire at the Fort Hood processing center in November 2009, killing 12 soldiers and one civilian. He injured 32 others in what was the deadliest mass shooting ever on a U.S. military installation.

Hasan acted as his own attorney during his 2013 trial, saying in his opening statement that the “evidence will clearly show that I am the shooter,” adding that he carried out the mass shooting in response to the U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The last execution by firing squad in the U.S. was of Army Pvt. Eddie Slovik in 1945. He was convicted of desertion — one of the 40,000 service members to desert during World War II, the Los Angeles Review of Books wrote in a 2014 retrospective of the film “The Execution of Private Slovik,” starring Martin Sheen. Slovik’s execution was the first for a soldier convicted of desertion since the Civil War.

Since then, the last U.S. military execution was of Army Pvt. John A. Bennett in 1961. Bennett was hanged after being convicted of rape and attempted murder, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, a national nonprofit organization focused on the death penalty.

Vice President Vance told reporters Friday that he will not be watching the execution if it is approved to be livestreamed. He added that he did not “know that that’s actually going to happen.”