'Hurtling into an abyss': Simon Marks on a firing squad meant to be watched
LBC's Washington editor joins James O'Brien to react to the plan to broadcast the execution of the Fort Hood shooter, and points out that America's last public execution was in 1936.
LBC
Story of Why this story? The video opened at a pace of 638,030 views a day, 17 times a normal first day on this channel (38,088).
'A grotesque spectacle' | Simon Marks reacts as Trump orders public execution
Simon Marks has been on James O'Brien's show almost every day this week, talking about the midterms and the White House. His latest appearance has a far heavier subject: the plan to broadcast the firing-squad execution of the former Army psychiatrist who killed 13 people at Fort Hood, Texas, in 2009. It passed half a million views within 16 hours, by a wide margin the biggest start among his recent conversations.
The segment includes archive footage of Pete Hegseth speaking to Jack Posobiec aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln. "No-brainer. Execution by firing squad," Hegseth says, adding: "And we'll make sure that people are able to watch it, that it's public."
Marks treats this as history as well as news. He notes that the last public execution in the United States took place in August 1936, and he describes Hegseth's language as retributive "brute force justice". "This is a country that has not just departed the railway tracks, it's hurtling into an abyss," he says. He also raises the Eighth Amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishment, and talks about having to explain the moment to his dual-national children. O'Brien adds that the prisoner uses a wheelchair, and the two end up discussing what the word civilization actually protects.
The conversation closes with a clip of Navi Pillay, the former UN human rights chief, arguing that "the death penalty is not reconcilable with human rights." That ties it to the rest of LBC's day, which also covered her Nobel Peace Prize and the US sanctions on the International Criminal Court.
O'Brien's own solo reaction to the livestream plan also started strongly, though with well under half the views. A separate upload gives the subject to LBC's callers, and the comment section under the Marks conversation has filled up about twenty times faster than usual.
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- Channel
- LBC
- Subscribers
- 1,530,000
- Channel views, last 7 days
- 11,855,504
- Channel views, pace per day
- 850,086 (on a normal day: 1,847,105)
- Video published
- October 9, 2026
- Video views so far
- 520,367 (less than a day online)
- Video views, pace per day
- 638,030
The numbers
The conversation's first day stands far above an ordinary LBC clip, even though the channel's overall daily views are running below their usual level.
