Gold Star families tired of battle over call to widow
The contentious back-andforth between President Trump and a Florida congresswoman over the commander in chief ’s conversation with the widow of a U.S. soldier killed earlier this month in Niger has left some families of fallen American troops soured.
The widow of Army Sgt. La David Johnson, Myeshia Johnson, has criticized Trump’s tone in a condolence call he made to her 12 days after her husband was killed in the ambush.
In the shadows of the ongoing battle, some relatives of fallen soldiers say they’ve had enough, while also coming to Trump’s defense.
“I’m not saying Ms. Johnson is wrong for the way she feels,” said Brittany Jacobs, who with her 6year-old son had a chance encounter with the president at Arlington National Cemetery while visiting the grave of her late husband, Marine Sgt. Christopher Jacobs, on Memorial Day. “Everyone grieves in their own way. There is no way that President Trump had any malicious intent when he called her.”
The episode has put Gold Star families, a term used by the military to describe the parents, siblings and children of men and women killed in combat, in the spotlight. For some, the spat has exacerbated the lingering grief that comes with losing a loved one in combat.
Don Schauwecker, whose 34year-old stepson Staff Sgt. Rick Blakley was killed by a sniper in Iraq in 2006, said he was listening to the radio while driving last week when he heard Trump’s chief of staff, retired Marine Gen. John Kelly, try to explain that Trump was paying tribute to Johnson. “I had to pull over and wipe the tears from my eyes.”
In the midst of the back-andforth, Janice Schauwecker said she fears the tragic deaths of four young soldiers in Niger have been turned into a political cudgel for Democrats to use against the president.
“It feels like the way things are going right now that if President Trump stubbed his toe, the big story would be about him wearing the wrong shoes,” said Schauwecker, who said she did not receive a call from President George W. Bush after her son’s death. “He did a good thing in calling the wife.”