Ashli Babbitt, the pro-Trump Air Force veteran who was fatally shot by Capitol Police during the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, is now set to receive full military funeral honors. This decision has angered one retired general, who called it “obscene.”
“I am infuriated that the Air Force plans to grant military funeral honors to Ashli Babbitt,” wrote Retired Army Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling in an op-ed published Saturday in The Bulwark. “She did not die defending the Constitution. She died trying to overturn it.”
Hertling, who served in the Army from 1975 to 2013, shared his experience of repeatedly swearing an oath to defend the Constitution during his career. Babbitt, who served 12 years in the Air Force and was deployed at least eight times, would have taken that same oath.
Hertling also remembered his time in Iraq, especially the death of a young soldier who was killed by a suicide bomber while standing guard at a military base gate.
“The soldier died at his post, saving lives by giving his own; that is service, that is sacrifice,” Hertling wrote.
“…(Babbitt) was not protecting lives at a gate in Iraq; she was forcing her way through windows in the Capitol to stop the peaceful transfer of power, one of the most sacred traditions of our Republic. To pretend that her death deserves the same recognition as the young soldier at the gate is obscene. It is a betrayal of the oath she once swore and a desecration of the sacrifice made by so many who kept faith with theirs.”
Babbitt has become a martyr figure for the MAGA movement, including for President Donald Trump, who called the Capitol Police officer who shot Babbitt, Lt. Michael Byrd, a “thug.” Other MAGA-aligned figures have also criticized her shooting.
The military funeral honors for Babbitt were previously denied under the Biden administration, a decision that Air Force Secretary Matthew Lohmeier, appointed by Trump and confirmed by the Senate last month, called an “incorrect determination.”
“After reviewing the circumstances of Ashli’s death, and considering the information that has come forward since then, I am persuaded that the previous determination was incorrect,” Lohmeier wrote in a letter to Babbitt’s family, shared on social media. “Additionally, I would like to invite you and your family to meet me at the Pentagon to personally offer my condolences.”
The Trump administration has also agreed to pay Babbitt’s family nearly $5 million to settle their wrongful death suit filed against the federal government.
