Actually, one of the Gold Star mothers said that every time they invited Trump they also invited Biden/Harris, it’s just that Trump was the only one who would even respond to any of their communications. To this day Biden and kamala have not communicated with those families beyond the day when the caskets arrived and Joe spent his time looking at his watch. Biden and kamala were reminded three separate times about this event at Arlington but never showed up.
Arlington wasn’t even going to let Trump be there until Speaker Johnson intervened. The family got permission for photos and video to be taken as a remembrance for them. And that’s how it would have remained if Arlington staff hadn’t tried to use the event against Trump.
Arlington staff took the photo of Trump and the family members with thumbs-up when one of the Gold Star moms asked them to snap it real quick as everybody was preparing to leave (Trump spent several hours there with the families; someone who has taken part in lots of ceremonies at Arlington said this was the most solemn and respectful event he had ever seen. It was NOT a “campaign event”, you liars at CNN). Then Arlington staff leaked the photos to NPR to try to slam/frame Trump for disrespectful behavior - claiming that photos were not allowed (a lie).
The Trump campaign said they could release video to exonerate themselves if necessary when Arlington staff made it sound like Trump’s people started a brawl. And eventually Trump posted on his personal TikTok account a video with audio of himself talking about how those deaths should never have happened. I’m not able to see the whole video because I don’t have a TikTok account, but what I saw had images from Arlington showing how Trump respected the fallen and their families.
My own belief is that Trump decided to let the media have their jabs at him in order to allow the message of the Gold Star families to get out: these were needless deaths and there will be more if we keep in office the idiots who caused this in the first place. Trump knew the only way the treasonous media would ever let the subject reach the unwashed masses was if they thought they could “get Trump”.
It’s very similar to what happened when Adam Schiff lied in Congress about Trump’s phone call with Zelensky. Trump ended up having to release the transcript of the call just to correct Schiff’s lies. Same here. Arlington staff leaked photos and lied about Trump’s manner there, forcing Trump to prove otherwise with photo evidence. He did not post it in a campaign ad but on his personal TikTok account, speaking up for the Gold Star families as far as I can tell.
IOW, Arlington staff broke their own rules by using Arlington photos to campaign against Trump via NPR (and then of course the whole stinking media continued the lie), while at the same time hiding behind the very “rules” that they broke, to say that Trump couldn’t defend himself from their lies because it’s only illegal when Trump does it, not when they do it.
The whole thing makes me have nothing but contempt for the people who work at Arlington who did this and the entire media and Harris folks (but I repeat myself).