Advertisement

Sen. Tammy Duckworth 'Appalled' By Trump's Reported Comments Denigrating Fallen Troops

Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) slammed President Donald Trump on Friday for reportedly referring to American service members who’d died in World War I as “losers” and “suckers” while in France in 2018.

“I am not shocked, but I am appalled,” Duckworth said Friday on a press call organized by Joe Biden’s presidential campaign. “Then again, this is the man who spent every day refining the concept of narcissism. Of course he thinks about war selfishly ... because that’s how he’s viewed his own life. He doesn’t understand people’s bravery and courage because he’s never had any of his own.”

Duckworth is an Iraq War veteran and Purple Heart recipient who lost both legs after her helicopter was hit by an RPG in 2004. She has been outspoken on veterans issues in the Senate and was under consideration to be Biden’s vice-presidential running mate.

“I’ll take my wheelchair and titanium legs over Donald Trump’s supposed bone spurs every day,” Duckworth added on the call, referring to the alleged condition Trump cited that gave him five deferments from service in Vietnam.

During Trump’s 2018 trip to France, the president canceled a planned visit to the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery ― a World War I cemetery in Belleau, France, near the site of the Battle of Belleau Wood. Trump blamed bad weather for the cancellation at the time.

According to multiple anonymous sources who had firsthand knowledge of the conversations cited by The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg, however, Trump had actually “rejected the idea of the visit because he feared his hair would become disheveled in the rain, and because he did not believe it important to honor American war dead.”

“Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers,” Trump reportedly said on the trip, according to Goldberg.

The Washington Post and The Associated Press have confirmed the story, with one former senior administration official telling the Post that Trump...

Continue reading on HuffPost