Some states require some form of public viewing of executions. Many states require journalists to be present, and the person being executed can invite people. Others also allow ordinary citizens to volunteer as witnesses.
But “there has never been a live-streamed execution,” says Deborah Denno, a law professor at Fordham University who has studied US execution methods.
A live-streamed execution would “enforce a level of transparency that we’ve probably never seen before in this country,” she says.
“More than half of the country wants the death penalty – even if this is on the decline – one could make an argument that “if you want the death penalty, we will show you how it is carried out in this country. And people would have to realize exactly what is happening in a way that many people ignore.”
Denno says there are important considerations for a live stream, such as whether it would be age-restricted and whether it would be against the policies of the online platform hosting the viewing.
It is not clear where the live stream will be available. Most major social media platforms have rules that prohibit or restrict livestreaming explicit content.
Meta, YouTube, TikTok and X, the most notable and widely used online platforms capable of streaming live video, have bans on not only violent images and videos, but those that show death.
Meta, the owner of Instagram, Facebook and Threads, explicitly prohibits any live stream of the death penalty.
TikTok has a similar blanket ban. Its policy reads: “We do not allow extremely graphic, violent or disturbing content – especially if it may cause viewers emotional distress.”
The policy at X, which has removed content moderation since Elon Musk took over the platform, says that any content depicting when a person dies will be removed “if we receive a request from their family or an authorized representative.”
The BBC has contacted the companies for comment.
Truth Social, the social media platform owned by Trump, does not have a live stream video feature for users.
The countries with the highest number of executions last year were China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and the United States, in that order, data from Amnesty International show.
While Trump has never publicly advocated for a public execution, he has long supported the death penalty. In 1989, for example, he took out large ads in the New York Times calling for the execution of the group called the Central Park Five – who were convicted of rape and assault charges, but were later acquitted.
Trump has previously condemned public executions in Iran, citing the Iranian government’s potential killing of protesters as a possible justification for military intervention before attacking the country earlier this year.
The US government had not executed anyone for 17 years until last year of Trump’s first term as president, when the government carried out a flurry of 13 executions.
When he returned last January, Trump quickly reversed predecessor Joe Biden’s moratorium on federal executions and signed an executive order to “restore” the death penalty and “protect public safety.”
The country’s last military execution took place in 1961, when a US Army private was hanged after being convicted of raping an 11-year-old Austrian girl. The execution was authorized by the then President Dwight D Eisenhower and took place despite the family of the victim’s successor, John F Kennedy, asking for clemency.
The last military execution by firing squad took place in January 1945, when a young US Army deserter, Eddie Slovik, was shot in the final months of World War II.
With additional reporting by Kwasi Gyamfi Asiedu and Kali Hays