Media

Dem rep jokes criticism from Kelly has made her ‘a rock star’

by Joe Concha - 10/20/17 8:59 AM ET

Rep. Fredericka Wilson (D-Fla.) in an interview with a Miami news station jested that chief of staff John Kelly’s criticism of her involvement in a phone call from President Trump to the family of a fallen soldier has turned her into “a rock star.”

“You mean to tell me that I have become so important that the White House is following me and my words?” she said to Fox-affiliate 7 News. “This is amazing. That is absolutely phenomenal. I will have to tell my kids that I’m a rock star now.”

Wilson made the comment in jest, referencing the amount of criticism and several threatening phone calls she’s received following her comments on Trump’s phone call.

“Let me tell you what my mother told me when I was little,” Wilson said. “She said, ‘The dog can bark at the moon all night long, but it doesn’t become an issue until the moon barks back.’ ” {mosads}

Wilson became the center of a media firestorm after calling the president’s remarks to the widow of Army Sgt. La David Johnson, who was killed during an ambush in Niger, “disrespectful” and called Trump himself a “sick man.”

“It stuns me that a member of Congress would’ve listened in on that conversation,” Kelly said of Wilson during a surprise appearance in the White House briefing room on Thursday. “I thought at least that was sacred.”

“In the long tradition of empty barrels making the most noise, she stood up there in all of that and talked about how she was instrumental in getting the funding for that building,” he continued. “We were stunned. Stunned that she had done it. Even for someone who was that empty of a barrel, we were stunned. But we didn’t go to the press.”

“Let’s not let this last thing that’s held sacred in our society — a young man or young woman going out and giving his or her life for our country — let’s try to somehow to keep that sacred,” he added.

Trump was asked on Monday why he had not personally addressed the deadly ambush in Niger, which had happened nearly two weeks earlier.

The president said in a Rose Garden press conference that he had written letters to and called Gold Star families before noting that “President Obama and other presidents, most of them didn’t make calls, a lot of them didn’t make calls” to families of the deceased.

The comments sparked heavy criticism from lawmakers, retired military officials and political pundits, who argued Trump was politicizing a sacred topic.

Tags John Kelly