Gold Star Mother Laments Trump’s Comments About the Fallen.
Gold Star Families need peace, and Trump’s remarks injure.
My son, Marine LCpl Benjamin Whetstone Schmidt, our family’s pride and joy, was killed in Afghanistan on October 6, 2011. Our lives will never be the same. Most Americans honor the fallen.
by Becky Whetstone, Ph.D.
Recently, I was traumatized by former President Donald Trump, and it wasn’t the first time. My son, Marine LCpl Benjamin Whetstone Schmidt, a proud scout sniper, was killed in Afghanistan on October 6, 2011, almost 12 years ago, becoming a war hero and breaking our hearts. Benjamin’s family members are now part of a group no one wants to be in — Gold Star Families. During World War I, families of fallen war heroes began wearing black armbands with a gold star on them, hanging banners and flags with a gold star in their windows and yards, and ever since, family members of fallen heroes have been referred to as a Gold Star Family. One of the loveliest things about being a Gold Star Mother is the warm embrace from so many from all across America. We receive cards, coins, blankets, medals, banners, flags, and more, all from private citizens who never met us but who care. Most of the American public respects and honors what we have been through and seems to understand our devastating loss and the sacrifice it is, not only for us but for the friends and soldiers themselves. The loving support and continued honoring acts we receive over the years help our hearts. Kindness helps.
And then, for the first time in anyone’s memory, a dark cloud descends on those of us who sacrificed. And it arrived in the form of the former President, Mr. Trump. People tend to report widely the crazy things this man says. Most I can brush off. But every few months, Mr. Trump is quoted saying denigrating things about America’s precious heroes who lost their lives and U.S. service members who were wounded or captured. This is from a man who, after his divorce from his former wife, Ivana, saw his three young children once a week and never took care of them himself. This has never happened before by a United States President, past or present. In fact, it’s been unimaginable. Since the rumors and stories about things Mr. Trump says have been leaked, my heart gets ripped open repeatedly. I can’t unhear it, and each time, I am propelled backward to my original pain and rage. I have met my son’s buddies who survived, all disabled in some way, some amputees, deaf, limping, gut pain, PTSD, and more deeply thoughtful, incredible men you will never meet. Mr. Trump’s mouth and dangerous threats against perceived enemies should have been stopped long ago. Yes, we have the right to free speech, but the listener has the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The fact that what comes out of his mouth damages people sometimes causing them to live in fear for their safety, should be held to account. We all know his enablers, MAGA Republicans, Fox News, NewsMax, and numerous pundits and personalities on various types of media will do nothing to shut him up or call him out for the continuous lies, pain, and fear he causes. Removing the 45th President from public life is needed, and this is a plea from an anguished mom, begging, Please shut him up. Please stop his noise.
For the record, Mr. Trump has denied some of what is listed below, but I know he is lying. I know he said it, all of it. He constantly lies, and I’m a therapist with 20 years of experience and was a journalist before that. I see him for what and who he is. Former White House officials, senior staff members, former Trump officials, and people who have worked for him in various roles all talk about the outrageous, shameless things he believes and says, about his lack of depth and intelligence, and we have all seen and heard much of it ourselves. It all comes out, all the shameless bits. The list below contains just a few lowlights …
- He denigrated late Senator John McCain for being a prisoner of war in Vietnam during his 2016 campaign. “I like people that weren’t captured,” he said then.
- Attacked and showed open contempt for a Gold Star family who spoke against him at the 2016 Democratic convention.
- The House Foreign Relations Committee members who are Trump sycophants hauled out Gold Star families of 13 soldiers killed during the Afghanistan retreat in 2021, using them for their political ends to criticize President Joe Biden. The families claimed they didn’t get all the answers about their children’s deaths … to them, I say, “I’m so sorry for your loss, and welcome to the club of getting little information about your child’s military death, but that’s happened to all of us, no matter who is president.”
- FormerTrump White House Chief of Staff and retired Marine General John Kelly last week confirms that Trump called wounded soldiers and fallen heroes “suckers” and “losers.” “There is nothing in it for them,” he told Kelly, who also is a Gold Star dad. His son, Marine 1st Lt. Robert Kelly, was killed on 10, 2010, in Afghanistan. Can you imagine saying that to a soldier and Gold Star dad? Kelly’s statement was leaked in the past but confirmed more recently.
- In 2022, in a book by Susan Glasser and Peter Baker, The Divider, Trump said he didn’t want any “wounded guys” in his Independence Day parade because it doesn’t make him look good.
- A Gold Star family member, Myeshia Johnson, widow of Army Sgt. Trump told La David Johnson that her husband “Knew what he signed up for, but it hurts anyways,” Johnson’s husband was killed in Niger in 2017, and said Trump only made her feel worse. I understand that. That is what he is doing to most all of us.
- He refused to visit U.S. Military war cemeteries in France because it was raining, and he didn’t want to mess up his hair.
- Mentioned to an aide that he didn’t want to be in the presence of military amputees or other U.S. Service Members who happened to be wounded warriors because it didn’t look good for him.
Understand that most Gold Star family members are angry in general. Most of us lost our children because someone did something stupid in some war that should never have happened. Most of us didn’t receive all the information we could or should have, and have learned firsthand how inept the military and armed forces can be in almost everything they do — how I would love to oversee notifications of Gold Star families, there is much room for improvement. In my case, our family was told Benjamin died while on patrol. We found out two weeks later that an American tanker gunner killed him, a fellow Marine, not following terms of engagement in a so-called friendly fire incident. We might never have known had a newspaper reporter for the Wall Street Journal not contacted us to do a front-page story about it. The tank commander who gave permission for his tank gunner to shoot at something he could not see was never punished, and both he and the gunner were sent right back into the battlefield. My son, a year prior to his death, lost a rank, was confined to the base for months, and was temporarily kicked out of the scout sniper platoon for refusing to blow in a breathalyzer while driving on base. Injustice, lack of organization, and no closure breeds anger. Almost every Gold Star family has stories like this to tell. These are the things we care about, things we would like to see changed.
But we have a cultural nuisance in the name of former President Trump, who reignites rage and anguish with his insistence on a world of perfection where there is no suffering, disease, or catastrophe, and only suckers and losers die in war. Is he saying good riddance to these American heroes? Instead of enraging and re-wounding Gold Star families, Mr. Trump could have done something positive for families like mine. He or any politician could ask us what we need or could benefit from. Still, instead, we have Mr. Trump, someone with great power and influence, denigrating our courageous and brave lost and injured loved ones for being somehow lesser than others, all because of their fate. A fate none of them desired. I posted about my anger about the former President’s comments on Twitter recently, and some of his followers responded with hysterical laughter memes and nasty remarks. He has enabled that sort of cruel and hateful discourse among fellow Americans. Trump’s attitude never changes. He doubles down on all of the horrible things he says.
I was about to make another commemorative video about my son to release on the day of his death, which I usually do. Who else will keep a child’s memory alive if it is not his mom? While planning it, comments surfaced about Mr. Trump insinuating that retiring Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley should be executed for treason. Soon after, Trump’s longest-serving White House Chief of Staff Kelly confirmed Trump’s comments about our lost loved ones being losers and suckers were accurate. Of course, they were, and my blood boiled. And it occurred to me that instead of making a video, I had to speak out. I had to write this. As a mom who lost her son in the war, I had to say, enough is enough officially. Stop it. Stop him. Someone has got to stop it. Our U.S. service members, many of whom support Mr. Trump, deserve to be treated honorably.
Suggestions? Stop quoting him; don’t give him a voice. Remove his bully pulpit. People in power who care about families like ours, wounded veterans, former prisoners of war, and anyone who serves our country, politicians, and influential leaders across the USA must step up now. The Republican leadership, people like Lindsey Graham, it’s time just to say it, even if it means losing your job. Say it’s too much, he’s gone too far, that you will no longer support this. There are plenty of people from the Trump administration leaking his outrageous acts. We have enough data to know exactly who he is. American history is watching, and if our country continues, people will ask why we allowed it. As I write this, Trump has been sitting in a courtroom as a judge decides the fate of his New York businesses. Having him face justice in court is a start, but Graham just released a statement about the case, “We’re not going to let New York get away with this. This judge is a joke!” I guess I can count Lindsey out for now.
American soldiers deserve our support from when they join the military until long after they’ve retired. This is a story about how America lets them down. It lets their families down. It is a story about how one man was allowed to rip us apart, to cause Gold Star Families continuous pain and fear of what he might say next. About how his followers may bully and mock us when we speak out or share a memory about our loved ones. Influential people have looked the other way and allowed it. The real suckers and losers are the lawmakers who haven’t thrown former President Trump in the waste bin of life so that he can’t run for office again and is stripped of all his Presidential privileges. If keeping his abuse on the public stage is more important than all of the things I’ve mentioned, then we are, indeed, lost.
Every Memorial Day is a big day for Gold Star Families. A day to remember our fallen heroes and to celebrate their lives. Every year, at least one or two of Benjamin’s platoon buddies come to visit us. They call me Mamma (as Benjamin spelled it) and let me dote on them. We laugh, cry, and help one another through the pain we all deeply feel. This is the good that comes from the bad.
Becky Whetstone, Ph.D., is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in Arkansas and Texas* and is known as America’s Marriage Crisis Manager®. She is a former features writer and columnist for the San Antonio Express-News and has worked with thousands of couples to save their marriages. She can work with you, too, as a life coach. She is also co-host of the Call Your Mother Relationship Show on YouTube and has a private practice in Little Rock, Arkansas, as a life coach via Zoom. To contact her, check out www.DoctorBecky.com and www.MarriageCrisisManager.com. Don’t forget to follow her on Medium so you don’t miss a thing!
For licensure verification, find Becky Whetstone Cheairs.
Sources:
Washington Post. 10/2/23. Aaron Blake, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/10/02/john-kellys-full-throated-confirmation-trumps-ugliest-comments-parsed/
Baker, P., & Glasser, S. (2022). The Divider. Anchor.
