A man places flowers at a headstone in Section 60, which marks the final resting place of servicemen and women at Arlington National Cemetery on May 27 in Arlington, Va.
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The 14-acre site at Arlington National Cemetery, which is primarily dedicated to veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, has become a flashpoint for controversy after a cemetery employee tried to prevent former President Trump’s campaign from holding a photo op there.
EQUAL NPR first reported the newsOn Monday, a scuffle broke out between a cemetery employee and Trump campaign officials over photos taken in an area in the eastern half of the cemetery known as Section 60. A source with knowledge of the incident told NPR that Arlington officials made it clear that only cemetery employees were allowed to take photos or film in the area.
Allison Jaslow, an Iraq War veteran who is now the CEO of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA), told NPR that she regularly visits Area 60, which for her is “a humbling reminder of how lucky some of us are to be home.”
Trump’s appearance in Arlington comes on the third anniversary of the deadly attack in Afghanistan that left 13 US soldiers was killed in August 2021 amid a chaotic US military withdrawal. A photo of the former president shows him smiling and giving a thumbs up next to the gravestone of Marine Sergeant Darin Taylor Hoover, alongside family members of the fallen soldier. Utah Governor Spencer Cox is also in the photo.
But there are two other gravestones visible — one belonging to a U.S. Army Special Forces soldier who committed suicide. A person close to that soldier’s family confirmed to NPR that they did not give permission for the gravestone to appear in the photos. NPR did not receive a response from the Trump campaign about whether it had asked permission from the Green Beret’s family.
Speaking about the incident that happened on Monday, IAVA “I find it hard to understand the idea that anyone who aspires to be an elected official would think of doing something like this,” Jaslow said.
Trump also laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
Former President Donald Trump lays a wreath next to U.S. Marine Corps Corporal Kelsee Lainhart (ret.) and U.S. Marine Corps Sergeant Tyler Vargas-Andrews (ret.), who was wounded in the Abbey Gate bombing, during a wreath-laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery on Aug. 26 in Arlington, Va.
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A visitor guide to the Arlington National Cemetery’s “Code of Conduct” states that “political campaign or election-related activities in the cemetery are prohibited.” In a statement to NPR on Wednesday about the incident, the cemetery stressed that: “Federal law prohibits political campaign or election-related activities in the Military National Cemetery, including photographers, content creators, or any other person attending for the purpose of or directly supporting the campaign of a partisan political candidate.”
The statement confirmed that an incident occurred and “a report was filed” but declined to name the Arlington officer involved.
Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung dismissed the idea of a fight, saying, “We are prepared to release footage if such defamatory statements are made.” So far, the Trump campaign has not produced any such video. Cheung also described the Arlington staffer who tried to block the Trump campaign from accessing Section 60 as suffering from a mental illness.
The Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) did not immediately respond to NPR’s request for comment, and America’s Gold Star Families, an organization whose stated mission is to “bring honor, hope, and healing to those grieving military loss while serving in the United States Armed Forces,” also declined to comment, saying only that NPR’s reporting “overshadows the honor of our fallen heroes and further divides the American people.”
Arlington National Cemetery was established on May 13, 1864, during the American Civil War. The cemetery was built from the Arlington Estate, land that the United States federal government had confiscated from the family of Confederate General Robert E. Lee. The cemetery includes deceased members from all branches of the United States military, but is administered by the United States Department of the Army.
Section 60 was inaugurated in 2018 and records about 900 service members killed in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Robert Poole, author of “Section 60: Arlington National Cemetery, Where War Comes Home,” in a talking about his book on C-SPAN in 2015, said of Section 60 in the cemetery that “emotions are closer to the surface.”
“From a distance, it looks like any other part of Arlington Cemetery,” Poole said. “But if you zoom in a little closer and start looking at the names on the graves, talking to some of the people who visit there, and [look at] Some of the things that people bring there to leave to their friends, comrades and loved ones, you find that it is quite different.”
The US troop withdrawal was carried out as part of February 2020 Peace Agreement signed with the Taliban during the Trump administration. The Biden administration missed the May 1, 2021, deadline set in the original agreement, but has promised to honor the terms of the troop withdrawal agreement by September 11 of that year.
