Myeshia Johnson: Trump 'Made Me Cry Even Worse'

The widow of US Army Sgt. La David Johnson has finally broken her silence about the phone call she received from President Donald Trump. Reports that the president was disrespectful in the phone call set off a controversy about the treatment of Gold Star families last week.

Myeshia Johnson appeared on ABC’s “Good Morning America” on Monday morning to give her side of the story. The appearance is the first time that Mrs. Johnson has publicly spoken about the controversy although Sgt. Johnson’s mother had previously corroborated claims by Rep. Frederica Wilson (D-Fl.) that Trump’s comments during the call had upset the family.

Mrs. Johnson spoke with ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos in a recorded interview. Johnson said that the president called as they were arriving at Dover AFB to meet Sgt. Johnson’s body. She asked that the phone speaker be turned on so that other relatives could hear.

From the ABC News transcript, Mrs. Johnson tells what happened next:

“The President, said that he knew what he signed up for, but it hurts anyway. And it made me cry ‘cause I was very angry at the tone of his voice and how he said he couldn’t remember my husband’s name. The only way he remembered my husband's name is because he told me he had my husband’s report in front of him and that’s when he actually said ‘La David.’ I heard him stumblin' on trying to remember my husband’s name and that’s what hurt me the most, because if my husband is out here fighting for our country and he risked his life for our country why can’t you remember his name. And that’s what made me upset and cry even more because my husband was an awesome soldier.”

Johnson said that after the call she was “very, very upset and hurt” and that “it made me cry even worse.” She added that Rep. Wilson was a longtime family friend and that her claims about the content of the phone call were “100 percent correct.”

Mrs. Johnson also said that she has questions about the circumstances of her husband’s death in Niger. “I want to know why it took them 48-hours to find my husband,” she said, adding that she was never allowed to view her husband’s body.

“They just told me that, um, it was a massive gunfire and my husband as of October 4th was missing, they didn't his whereabouts,” Johnson said. “They didn't know where he was or where to find him and a couple days later is when they told me that he went from missing to killed in action. I don’t know how he got killed, where he got killed or anything.”

Myeshia Johnson said that she intends to keep pushing for answers about her husband’s death and that she “want[s] the world to know how great of a soldier my husband was and [what] a loving and caring father and husband he was to our family.”

“He died as a hero,” she said.

Originally Published On The Resurgent

Stop Weaponizing Gold Star Families

The brouhaha over President Trump’s phone call to the widow of Sgt. La David Johnson has gotten even worse in recent days. After Chief of Staff John Kelly inserted himself in the debate, Kelly, himself a Gold Star father, became the subject of attacks from the left.

What have we become as a country when we use the families of fallen soldiers as weapons to attack political opponents? Or attack these families to protect politicians on our own side?

Not all of the families of fallen soldiers are going to say things that patriotic Americans agree with. Cindy Sheehan, the mother of Spc. Casey Sheehan, who was killed in Iraq in 2004, is a prime example of a Gold Star mother who says things that are offensive to many other Americans.

The bottom line, however, is that they have the right, as American citizens, to express their opinions. As Americans who have sacrificed a family member, they have paid an unusually high price for the right to speak their minds freely. Their opinions should be respected, if not necessarily agreed with.

Can we resolve the issue of the phone call to Mrs. Johnson without calling either President Trump or Cowanda Jones-Johnson a liar? Yes. It’s surprisingly easy to guess what happened when we lay aside political grudges and preconceptions.

Keep in mind that first-person witnesses to an event are notoriously unreliable. This is especially true in cases where the individuals are under stress and distracted. Neither side recorded the call so both only have their fallible human memories and impressions to fall back on.

My best guess as to what happened is that President Trump made the call to Sgt. Johnson’s widow in good faith and went off script, as he tends to do. What seemed to be an innocuous comment to the president and Gen. Kelly was taken differently by the Johnson family and Rep. Frederica Wilson (D-Fl.).

One of my favorite philosophies is Hanlon’s Razor, which advises, “Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.” This advice applies to both sides in the current debate.

First, liberals should acknowledge that Donald Trump would not intentionally act so callously toward the widow of a fallen American soldier. The fact that Gen. Kelly now backs up Trump’s claim is a powerful argument that Trump’s statement may have been misheard or misinterpreted.

Second, Trump supporters should not assume that the family is intent on using the death of Sgt. Johnson to embarrass and attack the president. To assume that a grieving family would lie about what they heard the president say, knowing that it would cause Sgt. Johnson’s name to be dragged through the mud and that family members would be subjected to personal attacks in their time of grief, defies logic.

Kelly’s statement seems to support the idea that the president unintentionally misspoke. Recalling the words of Gen. Joseph Dunford after the death of his own son in Afghanistan, Kelly said, “He was doing exactly what he wanted to do when he was killed. He knew what he was getting into by joining that one percent. He knew what the possibilities were because we were at war. And when he died he was surrounded by the best men on this earth, his friends. That's what the President tried to say to the four families the other day.”

That's what the President tried to say.

Kelly said that he had advised the president not to call the families of the fallen soldiers, but Trump had insisted. “If you're not in the family, if you've never worn the uniform, if you're not in combat, you can't even begin to imagine how to make that call,” Kelly said.

It would be easy, for a distraught wife and mother, especially if they were not fans of Donald Trump in the first place, to read disrespect and callousness into the president’s comments. This is especially true if he did indeed start to ramble.

If there is a villain in the story, it is Rep. Wilson. It was Wilson who politicized the phone call. Even if the family members were offended by Trump’s remarks, it was Wilson used that pain for political gain. It was Wilson who has continually subjected the family to unnecessary pain by keeping the issue in the news. It is Wilson who has led much of the country to question the integrity of Sgt. Johnson’s family, who undoubtedly loved and cared for him very much.

At this point, both sides should stand down. Let’s agree that attacking Gold Star families, whether they are the Johnsons or the Kellys, Democrats or Republicans, liberal or conservative, should be off limits. Families of fallen soldiers are entitled to speak, but, in the name of decency, politicians should refrain from speaking for them.

When Cindy Sheehan attacked President Bush in 2005, his response was a great example of dignity, patience and honor. “I sympathize with Mrs. Sheehan,” Bush said at the time. “She feels strongly about her position, and she has every right in the world to say what she believes. This is America. She has the right to her position.”

Originally published on The Resurgent