'So heartless': Gold Star mother rips Biden to shreds over what he said after her Marine son died in Afghanistan withdrawal



Gold Star families of the 13 military service members killed outside the Kabul airport during the disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal nearly two years ago blasted President Joe Biden on Monday.

During a congressional forum hosted by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), the families demanded that Biden provide more answers about why their loved ones died outside the Abbey Gate on Aug. 26, 2021. One mother in particular — Cheryl Rex, who lost her son Marine Lance Corporal Dylan Merola — revealed what Biden told her after her son's death.

According to Rex, the president offered sympathies by redirecting her grief back at himself.

"When Joe Biden, our elected president, entered the room, when he approached me, his words to me were, 'My wife Jill and I know how you feel. We lost our son as well and brought him home in a flag-draped coffin,'" Rex recounted. "My heart started beating faster and I started shaking, knowing that their son died from cancer and they were able to be by his side."

The remarks left Rex perplexed as to how someone could "be so heartless," because he made them just 24 hours after her son's murder.

"After this encounter, I have never had any personal correspondence, nor has my son been honored or his name spoken by this commander in chief or his administration, on what I feel is because of their failures and poor planning to exit our troops from Afghanistan," she said.

Gold Star families give first-ever testimony on Afghanistan withdrawal www.youtube.com

The common theme among the families at Monday's forum was they feel the Biden administration has not been honest about what happened on the day of the bombing.

Kelly Barnett, mother of Staff Sgt. Taylor Hoover, for example, said the families were fed "lies, given incomplete reports, incorrect reports, total disrespect." She said officials told her that her son died immediately. But she later learned from eyewitnesses that her son "lived for a little while."

Rex, meanwhile, said she heard from Marines who served with her son that Abbey Gate was targeted in a "complex attack," not a suicide bombing as officials claimed.

Not only did the parents blast the Biden administration for dodging accountability and allegedly lying, but parents criticized government officials for claiming the Afghanistan evacuation was successful.

Christy Shamblin, the mother-in-law of Marine Sgt. Nicole Gee, said such proclamations are "like a knife in the heart" and described them as "the ultimate disrespect."

The event was the first time the families were allowed the opportunity to address members of the government. Their remarks will officially be entered into the congressional record, Issa explained before family members spoke.

The Defense Department, when asked for comment about the stinging criticism, refused to address it.

"The Department of Defense expresses our deepest condolences to the Gold Star Families who lost loved ones during the tragic bombing at Abbey Gate. We are forever grateful for their service, sacrifice, and committed efforts during the evacuation operations," the Pentagon said in a statement, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported.

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Peter Doocy forces John Kirby into alarming admission about Afghanistan report — then second reporter bats cleanup



John Kirby admitted Thursday that an after-action report on the Biden administration's deadly withdrawal from Afghanistan is not about accountability.

At the White House press briefing, Fox News correspondent Peter Doocy wasted no time when it was his turn to question Kirby, the coordinator for strategic communications at the National Security Council, about the after-action report.

"Who's going to get fired over this?" Doocy asked.

Shockingly, Kirby suggested that no one will face any accountability for the embarrassing incident that ultimately led to the deaths of American soldiers and Afghanistan civilians.

"The purpose of the document that we’re putting out today is to sort of collate the chief reviews and findings of the agencies that did after-action reviews," Kirby said.

"The purpose of it is not accountability," he admitted. "The purpose of it is to study lessons learned."

04/06/23: Press Briefing by Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre www.youtube.com

But that's not true.

While Kirby said the report is not about "accountability," another reporter later confronted him over where the report does lay accountability. The reporter said, "You assign so much accountability to the Trump administration and very little, comparatively, to your own."

Indeed, the 12-page report repeatedly blames Trump for what happened under President Joe Biden's watch.

  • "President Biden’s choices for how to execute a withdrawal from Afghanistan were severely constrained by conditions created by his predecessor."
  • "President Biden had committed to ending the war in Afghanistan, but when he came into office he was confronted with difficult realities left to him by the Trump Administration."
  • "The departing Trump Administration had left the Biden Administration with a date for withdrawal, but no plan for executing it."
  • "The Trump Administration’s disregard and even hostility toward our commitment to Afghan allies led to a massive backlog of over 18,000 [Special Immigrant Visa] applicants. Despite drawing down troops and committing to a full withdrawal, the departing Trump Administration had all but stopped SIV interviews."
  • " The Trump Administration had hollowed out much of the career workforce, including at senior levels, at a moment when more resources were needed."

The report, on the other hand, completely absolves Biden.

In response to questions about blaming Trump, Kirby argued the Biden administration deserves congratulations for even completing an after-action report at all.

Later in the briefing, CBS News correspondent Ed O'Keefe confronted Kirby over the timing of the report's release.

"I think I speak on behalf of my colleagues in this room when we want the record to reflect that this was sent to us about 10 minutes before the briefing began with little notice, and it's the very definition of a modern major holiday news dump," O'Keefe said. "You're releasing this at the beginning of the high holidays and after months of requests from Republicans and the broader public."

\u201cJohn Kirby to CBS's @EdOKeefe on the WH dumping their Afghanistan withdrawal report ahead of a holiday weekend: "This is the result of months & months of work by individual agencies...to voluntarily review that withdrawal...No effort here to...obfuscate or...bury something"\u201d
— Curtis Houck (@Curtis Houck) 1680803632

Kirby, however, dismissed those concerns and claimed the report's release is the definition of transparency.

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