Arlington cemetery official in Trump staff clash won't press charges

Two men stand with their hands on their chests as other men stand in the background.

By Adriana Gomez Licon and Tara Copp

Aug. 29, 2024 Updated 12:24 PM PT

An Arlington National Cemetery official was “abruptly pushed aside” during an altercation with former President Trump’s staff but declined to press charges, an Army spokesman said Thursday.

The Army spokesman said the cemetery employee was trying to make sure those participating in the wreath-laying ceremony this week were following the rules, which “clearly prohibit political activities on cemetery grounds.”

“This employee acted with professionalism and avoided further disruption,” the statement said. “This incident was unfortunate, and it is also unfortunate that the ANC employee and her professionalism has been unfairly attacked.”

The incident was reported to the police, but because the employee decided not to press charges, the Army said it considered the matter closed.

The Trump campaign has been facing blowback since an NPR report said that two Trump campaign staff members on Monday had “verbally abused and pushed” aside a cemetery official who tried to stop them from filming and photographing in Section 60, the burial site for military personnel killed while fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Federal law prohibits campaign or election-related activities within Army national military cemeteries.

The Trump campaign has claimed the Republican presidential nominee’s team was granted access to have a photographer and has contested the allegation that a campaign staffer pushed a cemetery official.

Trump visited the venerable cemetery on Monday at the invitation of surviving family members to mark the third anniversary of a suicide bombing at the Kabul airport, which killed 13 American service members and more than 170 Afghans.

Photos of the visit showed Trump smiling by the graves and flashing a thumbs-up next to relatives of Staff Sgt. Darin Taylor Hoover and Sgt. Nicole Gee. He also laid wreaths for Staff Sgt. Ryan Knauss, whose family was not present. Markers of other fallen service members are distinguishable in the images and people at other grave sites are visible in the background.

A video shared by Trump on TikTok also shows several clips of his visit to the cemetery. As a guitar strums in the background, there is a voiceover of the Republican nominee saying, “We lost great, great people. What a horrible day it was.”

Trump also spent the third anniversary of the Aug. 26, 2021, attack blaming his Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, and President Biden for the chaos of the Afghanistan war withdrawal in remarks at a campaign event.

Trump set the military withdrawal from Afghanistan in motion before he left office. His administration made a deal with the Taliban in negotiations that did not include the Afghan government.

The family of a decorated Green Beret whose grave appeared in the photos of Trump’s visit issued a statement expressing support for the families who lost loved ones in the Kabul airport bombing, but asking for understanding for the concerns from relatives of service members whose graves were near them.

“We hope that those visiting this sacred site understand that these were real people who sacrificed for our freedom and that they are honored and respected accordingly,” said the statement, which was sent by the sister of Silver Star recipient Master Sgt. Andrew C. Marckesano on behalf of the family.

Master Sgt. Marckesano was deployed overseas six times.

A Pentagon official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter, said that the Trump campaign had been warned before its arrival and the altercation about not taking photographs in Section 60 of the cemetery.

“Federal law prohibits political campaign or election-related activities within Army National Military Cemeteries, to include photographers, content creators or any other persons attending for purposes, or in direct support of a partisan political candidate’s campaign,” an earlier cemetery officials’ statement said. “Arlington National Cemetery reinforced and widely shared this law and its prohibitions with all participants.”

Trump’s spokesperson Steven Cheung said the team was granted access to have a photographer and disparaged the official. “For whatever reason, an unnamed individual, clearly suffering from a mental health episode, decided to physically block members of President Trump’s team during a very solemn ceremony,” he said.

Chris LaCivita, a top Trump campaign advisor, said Trump was there at the invitation of the families of the service members killed in the airport bombing. The Trump campaign posted a message signed by relatives of two of the service members that said “the president and his team conducted themselves with nothing but the utmost respect and dignity.”

“For a despicable individual to physically prevent President Trump’s team from accompanying him to this solemn event is a disgrace and does not deserve to represent the hollowed grounds of Arlington National Cemetery,” LaCivita said in a written statement, misspelling the word hallowed, and saying the cemetery official was lying.

Michael Tyler, a spokesperson for Harris, said the reports of the altercation were “what we’ve come to expect from Donald Trump and his team.”

“Donald Trump is a person who wants to make everything all about Donald Trump,” Tyler said on CNN on Wednesday. “He’s also somebody who has a history of demeaning and degrading military service members, those who have given the ultimate sacrifice.”

Democrats have drawn attention to Trump’s statements about service members for years, particularly after he said of former prisoner of war and then-Sen. John McCain of Arizona in 2015: “He’s not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured.”

A Pentagon investigation into the attack at the Kabul airport concluded that the suicide bomber acted alone and that the deaths of more than 170 Afghans and 13 U.S. service members were not preventable.

Gomez Licon and Copp write for the Associated Press. Times staff contributed to this report.