White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Wednesday said the six U.S. soldiers killed in Iranian drone strikes will receive a dignified transfer.
“President Trump intends to attend the dignified transfer of these American heroes to stand in grief alongside their families,” she said during the White House press briefing.
The Army has publicly identified four of the six deceased soldiers as Sgt. 1st Class Nicole Amor of White Bear Lake, Minn.; Capt. Cody Khork of Lakeland, Fla.; Sgt. 1st Class Noah Tietjens of Bellevue, Neb.; and Sgt. Declan Coady of Des Moines, Iowa.
The service members, who CBS News reported were killed in a make-shift office space at a civilian port in Kuwait, will be transported to the United States at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware.
Sean Parnell, the Pentagon’s chief spokesperson, described the site as a “secure facility fortified with 6-foot walls,” in a Tuesday post on social platform X.
Leavitt was also asked about Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s comments earlier in the day criticizing the media for making the death of service members front-page news.
CNN’s Kaitlan Collins said, “Secretary Hegsethth was complaining that it was front-page news about these six servicemembers who were killed.”
Leavitt responded, “That’s not what the Secretary said, Kaitlan, and that’s not what the Secretary meant, and you know it. You know you’re being disingenuous.”
Leavitt continued, “There is not — we’ve never had a Secretary of Defense who cares more.”
Collins read out Hegseth’s comments from a Wednesday morning press briefing, “When drones get through, when tragic things happen, it’s front-page news! I get it, the press only wants to make the President look bad.”
“As you know, we cover the debts of U.S. servicemembers under every president,” Collins added.
“The press does only want to make the President look bad. That’s a fact,” Leavitt responded, adding, “especially you, and especially CNN.”
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5767385-dignified-transfer-us-soldiers-kuwait/