Two National Guard soldiers hit during a shooting in Washington, not far from the White House, are in critical condition. The director of the FBI, Kash Patel, said this in a press conference, denying the West Virginia governor’s news according to which the two soldiers were dead.
On the eve of Thanksgiving, the most important holiday for Americans, terror descends on downtown Washington. Two blocks from the White House, in an area crowded with local and international tourists especially in recent days, a man opened fire around 3pm local time (9pm in Italy) and seriously injured two soldiers of the National Guard, the force deployed by Donald Trump to fight crime in the city.
The president was not at the residence at the time of the attack but at Mar-a-Lago, Florida, for the holiday weekend. The suspect, a 29-year-old Afghan who would have arrived in the US in 2021 with the ‘Biden plan’, was arrested in less than half an hour, thanks also to the large number of police forces that normally circulate in that area of Washington.
According to the mayor of the capital Muriel Bowser, the shooting was “a targeted attack” against the National Guard soldiers.
The dynamics of the shooting are still unclear
According to CNN, the military opened fire first and then were hit. So they may have intervened to prevent a massacre or they may have been the target of the attack themselves. Since August, when the president sent over 2,000 National Guard troops to the capital, there have been no incidents. But tension is high in Washington, as in other US cities “militarized” by Trump. Residents of the capital are now accustomed to seeing soldiers, armed and wearing bulletproof vests, roaming the streets. Some approach them for a photo or even to thank them “for their service”. However, there are also those who do not like their presence because they associate it with the crackdown on immigration and the raids of anti-migrant agents, even though there is no real connection, also because those soldiers cannot make arrests.
“This heinous assault was an act of evil, of hatred and terror. It was a crime against our entire nation, against all humanity,” Trump said in a message to the nation. “The hearts of all the American people today are with the two soldiers of the West Virginia National Guard and with their families – added Trump -. The love of our entire country pours upon them and we accompany them in our prayers. We are full of anguish and pain, but at the same time we are full of righteous anger and ferocious determination”. “Based on the information gathered, the Department of Homeland Security is convinced that the suspect in custody is a foreigner who entered our country from Afghanistan, hell on Earth – he underlined again -. He arrived under the Biden administration in 2021, on those infamous flights that everyone was talking about. Nobody knew who was coming. Nobody knew anything. His status was renewed under a law signed by Biden, a disastrous president, the worst in the history of our country”.
“Now we will review every single foreigner who has entered our nation from Afghanistan under President Biden – added the tycoon -, and we will take all necessary measures to guarantee the expulsion of any foreigner from any country who does not belong to this nation or who does not bring benefits to this nation. If they do not know how to love our country, then we do not want them. America will never bow to terror or give in to terror. At the same time, we will not be distracted from the mission that these soldiers have carried out with nobility. I can announce that I have directed the War Department to mobilize an additional 500 troops to help protect our capital. We will make America totally safe again, and we will bring the perpetrator of this barbaric attack to swift and certain justice, “if the bullets going in the other direction have not already done so.”
The director of the Bureau, Kash Patel, assured the maximum commitment and the attorney general Pam Bondi commented on X, writing: “Federal agents are at the scene of the terrible shooting involving two members of the National Guard in Washington, pray for them”.