Fox hosts praise bringing back death penalty by firing squad, claiming they are “just honest”
Pete Hegseth on South Carolina death row inmates: “Shoot ‘em, stick ‘em, or fry ‘em”
Published
Citation From the May 5, 2021, edition of Fox News' Primetime
PETE HEGSETH (HOST): All right, third one, this is a new one, shoot ‘em, stick ‘em or fry ‘em. There are now three ways to die in South Carolina if you are on-- if you're a death row inmate.
WILL CAIN (CO-HOST, Fox & Friends Weekend): That's not -- that's terrible. No, that's terrible.
HEGSETH: Listen, they wrote it, I'm reading it. Late today, the state house there, this is a real story, voted to reinstate the firing squad as an alternative to lethal injection and the electric chair, due to a nationwide shortage in lethal injection drugs. According to a local news station, the measure would jump-start execution in the state that once had the busiest death chambers in the nation. What do you think? Death, firing squad?
CAIN: OK, so not only do I not -- not only do I not have a problem with it, I would suggest to you it might be a more preferable means of execution.
HEGSETH: I agree with you.
CAIN: So, first of all, individually, you've got to come to that conclusion morally. Statewide, you got to have this debate. But, here's the thing, firing squads are at least more honest about what you're doing. I think sometimes when we do lethal injection or whatever we're trying to ease us as a society --
HEGSETH: Go to sleep.
CAIN: We're trying to ease our own pain that we are doing this to someone, that we decided deserves it. Firing squads are just honest.
HEGSETH: They are.