Sgt. La David Johnson, 25, was among the four US troops who were killed in Niger nearly two weeks ago during an ambush
The grieving aunt of a fallen Green Beret hero at the center of a controversy over presidential condolence calls has been overcome by grief at his wake.
Sharon Wright broke down in tears on Friday at her nephew’s public viewing ceremony in Cooper City, Florida, where family members and medics aided the grieving aunt.
Sgt. La David Johnson, 25, was among the four US troops who were killed in Niger nearly two weeks ago during an ambush.
A 12-man force of Green Berets fell under fire by up to 50 ISIS -linked forces, according to early accounts described by the Pentagon.
Earlier Friday, it emerged that that after the ambush happened, it wasn’t until 48 hours after the attack that the body of Sgt. La David Johnson was recovered.
The patrol took place without US air support.
Family members Sallie Meadows, right, and Valerie LaBranche, take care of Sharon Wright, center, after she came out of her nephew’s Sgt. La David T. Johnson viewing on Friday
Sharon Wright (center) the aunt of US Army Sgt. La David Johnson is comforted as she is overcome with emotion during the viewing in Cooper City, Florida
Following a public viewing, the coffin of US Army Sergeant La David Johnson, who was among four special forces soldiers killed in Niger, is taken from Christ The Rock Church in Cooper City
The force had light ‘technical’ vehicles, but the vehicles were not heavily armored when they were lured into an ambush by fighters on motorcycles.
The uproar over President Donald Trump and how presidents should or shouldn’t try to console families of the fallen showed no signs of letting up.
The White House is defending chief of staff John Kelly after he mischaracterized the remarks of a Democratic congresswoman who spoke out about Trump’s call to Johnson’s family.
Trump spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders says it is ‘inappropriate’ to question a retired four-star general such as Kelly.
The administration also insisted it’s long past time to end the political squabbling over President Donald Trump’s compassion for America’s war dead, even as it lobbed fresh vilification at Florida Rep. Frederica Wilson.
Kelly said Wilson delivered a 2015 speech at an FBI field office dedication in which she ‘talked about how she was instrumental in getting the funding for that building.’ Video of the speech contradicted his recollection.
The late Army Sgt. La David Johnson is pictured with his mother Cowanda Jones-Johnson, who is backing up Rep. Frederica Wilson’s account of a condolence call in which Donald Trump told her the slain solider ‘knew what he signed up for’
For her part, Wilson is bringing race into the dispute, telling The New York Times, ‘The White House itself is full of white supremacists’.
Also on Friday, another aunt of Johnson called Trump an ‘S.O.B.’ in an exclusive interview with DailyMailTV.
‘Our president is an S.O.B.’ said Katrina Johnson, 42, as she wiped away tears.
Trump has denied reducing pregnant mother-of-two Myeshia Johnson to tears by saying her husband ‘knew what he signed up for’ during a telephone call to offer his condolences.
Katrina Johnson said about her nephew: ‘That was my baby – my heart and soul. I’m so proud of him’
But Katrina Johnson believes her family’s account of the conversation and says Trump’s supposed comments are a grave insult to her patriot nephew.
‘We hurt,’ she told DailyMailTV.
‘My family was in a car on the way to the airport to pick up his body and the words he told to a grieving widow were wrong.’
She added: ‘The hardest part… is not being able to see him any more, not watching him becoming the man he had become.
‘He’s got a son and a daughter that he won’t watch grow up. It’s heartbreaking for all of us.
‘ He was a leader, a hero, a lovable person. He died doing what he wanted to do.’