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Kamala Harris has now joined the growing backlash against Donald Trump over his controversial visit to Arlington National Cemetery where his staffers allegedly pushed a cemetery official, he posed with a thumbs up at a soldier’s grave and his team filmed a campaign ad.
In a scathing statement posted on X on Saturday, the Democratic presidential candidate slammed her Republican rival’s “political stunt” calling him “a man who is unable to comprehend anything other than service to himself.”
“It is a solemn place; a place where we come together to honor American heroes who have made the ultimate sacrifice in service of this nation. It is not a place for politics,” she wrote.
“And yet, as was reported this week, Donald Trump’s team chose to film a video there, resulting in an altercation with cemetery staff. Let me be clear: the former president disrespected sacred ground, all for the sake of a political stunt.”
Harris pointed to Trump’s past record of offending America’s service members and veterans saying that this week’s events are “nothing new from Donald Trump”.
“This is a man who has called our fallen service members ‘suckers’ and ‘losers’ and disparaged Medal of Honor recipients. A man who, during a previous visit to the cemetery, reportedly said of fallen service members, ‘I don’t get it. What was in it for them?’ This is a man who is unable to comprehend anything other than service to himself,” she wrote.
“If there is one thing on which we as Americans can all agree, it is that our veterans, military families, and service members should be honored, never disparaged, and treated with nothing less than our highest respect and gratitude.”
Harris said that “someone who cannot meet this simple, sacred duty should never again stand behind the seal of the President of the United States of America.”
Mere minutes after Harris posted the statement blasting her rival for the White House, Trump’s running mate JD Vance leaped to his defense.
“President Trump was there at the invitation of families whose loved ones died because of your incompetence. Why don’t you get off social media and go launch an investigation into their unnecessary deaths?” he responded on X.
Harris’s comments come as Trump continues to face the fallout from his scandal-plagued visit to Arlington National Cemetery on Monday.
The former president had been visiting the military cemetery for a wreath-laying ceremony in memory of the 13 US service members who were killed in the Abbey Gate terrorist attack in August 2021, on what marked the third anniversary of the US’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan.
During Monday’s visit, two Trump campaign staffers are accused of verbally abusing and physically pushing a female cemetery official after she warned them that they could not, due to federal laws, film or take photos in Section 60 – where recent US casualties are buried.
The US Army confirmed in a statement on Thursday that a female official was “abruptly pushed aside” by Trump aides during the altercation and that an incident report had been filed.
The woman ultimately decided not to press charges over fear of retaliation,the New York Times reported.
When the incident first came to light, Trump’s campaign team members Chris LaCivita and Steven Cheung attacked the Arlington staffer saying she was “clearly suffering from a mental health episode” and insisted they had permission to film in the area.
The Army has poured cold water on the claims saying that “participants in the August 26th ceremony and the subsequent Section 60 visit were made aware of federal laws, Army regulations and DoD policies, which clearly prohibit political activities on cemetery grounds.”
The statement continued: “This incident was unfortunate and it is also unfortunate that the ANC employee and her professionalism has been unfairly attacked.”
Despite the efforts of the Arlington staffer, Trump’s campaign team did film a campaign video during the ceremony – and posted it on TikTok this week, prompting further fury with social media users branding it “disgusting.”
The furor over the filming and physical altercation wasn’t the first controversy to plague Trump’s visit to Arlington.
The former president had also sparked backlash after he was pictured smiling and flashing a thumbs up next to the graves of fallen soldiers.
Trump, meanwhile, has tried to deflect the scandal back on Harris by claiming that she “killed” US soldiers in Afghanistan while on stage at a campaign event in Michigan on Thursday.
