ARLINGTON, Va. (AP) — President Donald Trump paid tribute to fallen service members during a Memorial Day ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery on Monday, in an address that honored the “great, great warriors” yet also briefly veered into politics as he boasted of a nation he is “fixing after a long and hard four years.”
Though the holiday is one that U.S. presidents typically treat with pure solemnity, Trump began it with an all-caps Memorial Day social media post that attacked his predecessor and called federal judges who have blocked his deportation initiatives “monsters who want our country to go to hell.”
Yet at Arlington National Cemetery, where more than 400,000 have been laid to rest, Trump commemorated the sacrifice of U.S. service members and singled out several Gold Star families to tell the stories of their fallen relatives.
“We just revere their incredible legacy,” Trump said. “We salute them in their eternal and everlasting glory. And we continue our relentless pursuit of America’s destiny as we make our nation stronger, prouder, freer and greater than ever before.”
“Their valor,” he said, “gave us the freest, greatest and most noble republic ever to exist on the face of the earth. A republic that I am fixing after a long and hard four years.”
During his remarks, Trump told the story of Navy Senior Chief Petty Officer Shannon Kent, killed along with three other Americans by a suicide bomber in 2019 in Syria, leaving behind her husband, 3-year-old son and 18-month-old son.
The Pine Plains, New York, native was on her fifth combat deployment, he said, embedded with a team hunting Islamic State group militants in Syria, serving as linguist, translator and cryptologic technician working alongside special forces.
“She was among the first women ever to do it, and she did it better than anyone,” Trump said, calling out Kent’s family for applause at the ceremony.
The crowd also heard of Air Force Senior Master Sgt. Elroy Harworth from Erhard, Minnesota, whose plane went down in enemy territory during the Vietnam War, dying while his wife was seven months pregnant. His son, who was cheered in the audience, followed his father’s path and has been in the Army for 20 years.
There was also the story of Army Cpl. Ryan McGhee of Fredericksburg, Virginia, who enlisted after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and whose mother was in the audience.
Trump said McGhee knew he wanted to be an Army Ranger since he saw the towers fall on that day, did three tours in Afghanistan, then deployed to Iraq. Sixteen years ago this month, the president said, McGhee died in a firefight, and “gave his life at 21 years old.”
Vice President JD Vance, who spoke before Trump, said the lesson of all the gravestones is: “We must be cautious in sending our people to war.” He urged the crowd to push political leaders to treat the lives of soldiers as the “most precious resource.”
Later in his remarks, Trump pointed to a “big, big celebration” coming next year as the U.S. celebrates its 250th birthday, joking that “in some ways, I’m glad I missed that second term” when he lost to Joe Biden.
“Because I wouldn’t be president for that,” Trump said, as the crowd laughed. “In addition, we have the World Cup and we have the Olympics. Can you imagine? I missed that four years. And now look what I have, I have everything. Amazing the way things work out.”
Prior to speaking, Trump placed a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, a somber tradition for U.S. presidents. The president paused after placing the wreath, then stepped back and saluted during the playing of taps. Vance and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth joined him.
The president began the day with a decidedly different tone.
In a social media message in all capital letters, Trump ranted at Biden, calling him the “scum” who spent the last four years trying to destroy the country with radical leftism and who, he said, left behind an open border.
That was after he posted a separate message proclaiming “HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY!” Wishing people a happy Memorial Day is regarded as verboten because the day is considered a somber one to honor soldiers killed in service.
Vance emphasized as much when he spoke to U.S. Naval Academy graduates in Annapolis on Friday, when he said that he and Trump would “lead the most solemn occasion in our nation, Memorial Day at Arlington Cemetery.
“You will learn as I have that when people say things like ‘Happy Memorial Day,’ you appreciate the sentiment behind it but know that it’s wrong because Memorial Day is not a happy day,” Vance said last week. “Memorial Day is not for those who served and came home, it is for those who served that didn’t.”
