The New York Times has turned victim-blaming and gaslighting into an art form, using Gold Star families who lost loved ones at Abbey Gate as a cudgel to attack former President Donald Trump — all the while pretending that Trump was using them to attack Vice President Kamala Harris.
On August 26th, a confrontation allegedly occurred between a member of Trump’s entourage and a staffer at Arlington National Cemetery. Trump was invited to attend a wreath-laying ceremony at the cemetery by the families of servicemen who lost their lives during the 2021 Afghanistan withdrawal. The staffer alleged that a member of Trump’s campaign team, upon being told that they could not photograph the ceremony, had verbally abused and physically “pushed the official aside.”
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Trump’s campaign denies that there was a physical altercation, and says that the families who invited the president approved of the photographer’s presence. Arlington National Cemetery confirmed that there “was an incident, and a report was filed” but did not release video or any further details “to protect the identity of the individual involved.”
Still, the media ran with the story, calling it “outrageous” and “offensive” and accusing Trump of using the Gold Star families as props to further his 2024 presidential campaign. The New York Times alone ran half a dozen stories, all attacking Trump:
- Trump Team Clashed With Official at Arlington National Cemetery: The military cemetery said in a statement that federal law prohibits political campaigning on the grounds, and that “there was an incident, and a report was filed.”
- Trump Videos at Arlington Stir More Fallout After Gravesite Visit: The family of a Green Beret buried there expressed concern about videos and photos taken by his grave. And a cemetery employee declined to press charges after an altercation with the Trump team, fearing retribution.
- Trump Aide ‘Abruptly Pushed Aside’ an Arlington Cemetery Official, the Army Says: The statement from the Army is the first detailed description of an altercation that took place on Monday, as Mr. Trump appeared for a wreath-laying ceremony.
- At Arlington, Trump Returns to the Politics of the ‘Forever Wars’: The 2024 presidential race is the first in 24 years without a major American ground war, but Donald J. Trump continues to stoke division over the post-9/11 conflicts that helped give rise to his movement.
- Others Have Politicized Arlington, but Trump’s Approach Has No Precedent: Donald J. Trump isn’t the first candidate to run afoul of the ban on partisan activity in Arlington National Cemetery. But no one else has responded as hostilely as his campaign has.
After nearly a full week of attacks on Trump — including a lengthy statement from Harris — Gold Star family members themselves posted a series of video statements defending Trump, and arguing that Biden and Harris were the reason they had to visit Arlington in the first place.
The Trump campaign shared those videos prompting yet another headline from the Times on Sunday, not acknowledging the Gold Star families’ support for Trump, but accusing the former president of using the families of the fallen to wage political attacks against Harris.
“Trump Campaign Uses Statements From Gold Star Families to Attack Harris: It was the latest effort by the Trump campaign to defend itself after the campaign defied a ban on political campaigning at Arlington National Cemetery.”
If one were to judge solely by the coverage, The New York Times appears to believe that the controversy began with Trump’s visit to Arlington National Cemetery, the three-year anniversary of the suicide bombing at Hamid Karzai International Airport that claimed the lives of 13 American service members.
But in reality, the scene was set just over three years prior when President Joe Biden — along with Kamala “Last Person In The Room” Harris — condemned the United States military to certain failure by refusing to allow his generals enough troops to safely maintain Bagram Air Base.
Every bit of the chaos that followed could be traced back to that one moment, that one decision for which Harris at the time gleefully took credit. In the years that followed, the families of those lost and injured on that day have received naught but lip service from the Biden-Harris administration.
Biden showed up, solo, for the dignified transfer ceremony when the bodies of the 13 killed were returned to American soil. But even then, he was clearly disengaged — checking his watch as the families of the fallen each awaited their own worst nightmare: a flag-draped box in place of their son, daughter, husband, or wife.
When Biden did speak to them, he referenced his son Beau Biden — a veteran who died of brain cancer years after returning home from deployment — and claimed a share of their pain.
And that was it. There were no memorials. There were no phone calls. And making things exponentially worse, the Biden-Harris administration insisted on casting the entire operation as an unqualified “success.”
Meanwhile, Trump hosted the families at his Bedminster Golf Club in New Jersey, spending hours with them and promising to hold accountable the people who planned the operation that left their loved ones dead.
It should not come as a shock to the media or the Harris campaign that a number of Gold Star families invited Trump to the wreath-laying ceremony, nor that the president found himself in Section 60 – where casualties from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are buried. Trump did not duck out after a quick photo op, but instead went where the families went to honor their loved ones.
While Biden checked his watch on the tarmac and made every subsequent interaction about himself and his son — and Harris could not be bothered to even pick up a phone — Trump met the families where they were. The families recognized that. And The New York Times still saw fit to twist their words into political weapons.
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