President Donald Trump’s White House has attacked journalists for comments made following the shooting of two National Guard members in Washington, D.C.
In the aftermath of Wednesday’s “targeted” attack near the White House, administration officials took issue with reporters raising questions about Trump deploying troops to the capital district.
The blowback comes as Trump’s frequent attacks on the media have become more personal in recent weeks.
The fiercest criticism was aimed at New Yorker writer Jane Mayer, who said the shooting was “so tragic, so unnecessary” as the National Guard “should never have been deployed” to Washington, D.C.
“I live in D.C. and watched as they had virtually nothing to do but pick up trash. It was for political show and at what a cost,” Mayer said in a post on X.
In response, Steven Cheung, the White House communications director, wrote: “Jane, respectfully, shut the fuck up for trying to politicize this tragedy.”
“They were protecting D.C, and trying to make the nation’s capital safer. People like you who engage in ghoulish behavior lose all credibility. Not like you had any to begin with,” he added.
The White House’s rapid response X account also weighed in, calling Mayer a “sick, disgusting ghoul.”
The White House account also tore into MS NOW correspondent Ken Dilanian as he reported on the shooting in its immediate aftermath.
In a 30-second clip shared on X, Dilanian spoke of “so much controversy happening in the United States right now.”
“There’s – you don’t know – people walking around with uniforms in an American city. There are some Americans that might object to that,” he added.
The White House tagged Dilanian and said, “You are beyond sick.”
Meanwhile, at a Thursday news briefing, Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, snapped at a reporter for asking about people being “upset” with Trump for deploying troops to the capital district.
“I don’t even wanna talk about whether they should’ve been there,” the former Fox News host responded, adding that “we ought to kiss the ground and thank God” for the president’s crime crackdown.
The suspect in the shooting is 29-year-old Afghan national Rahmanullah Lakanwal, who worked with the CIA in Afghanistan.
He faces charges of assault with intent to kill while armed and possession of a firearm during a crime of violence.
The guard members shot were identified as Specialist Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24. Both remain hospitalized in critical condition.
Pirro said it is “too soon to say what the motive is.”
In a video posted on social media shortly after the shootings, Trump called for a further crackdown on immigration following the “act of terror.”
He said that lax migration policies are “the single greatest national security threat facing our nation,” and ordered 500 more National Guard members to Washington.
Trump has been on quite a run with the media. Last week, he called a New York Times reporter “ugly” after publishing a story about the president’s health, and recently said “quiet, piggy” to a Bloomberg News reporter who asked him questions about Jeffrey Epstein.