(CNN) -- Sen. Joseph Lieberman said Sunday he intends to launch a Senate committee hearing on whether the Fort Hood shootings were a terrorist act and if the Army should have taken pre-emptive steps due to reported signs of Islamic extremism by the suspected gunman.

"I'm intending to begin a congressional investigation of my Homeland Security Committee into what were the motives of (Maj. Nidal Malik) Hasan in carrying out this mass murder," the Connecticut independent who belongs to the Democratic caucus said on "FOX News Sunday."

If Hasan was showing signs of being an Islamic extremist, the Army should have acted on that earlier and "he should have been gone," said Lieberman, the chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.

The-CNN-Wire/Atlanta
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