The parents of Staff Sgt. Darin Taylor Hoover said President Joe Biden’s administration lied to them after their son died in the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Hoover was among the thirteen soldiers killed in the suicide bomb explosion at the Kabul airport in Aug. 2021, following the Biden administration’s decision to completely withdraw troops from Afghanistan. His mother, Kelly Barnett, testified in Escondido, California, with other gold star parents on Monday, where she emotionally described the Biden administration’s involvement in her son’s death.
Barnett and Darin Hoover, the slain service member’s father, discussed what he said were the administration’s lies and lack of accountability during a “Fox & Friends” interview on Tuesday. Barnett said she found out the truth about her son’s death after officials falsely told her Hoover died on impact.
“My son gave eleven years of his life to this country. I think that deserves some dang respect and I didn’t get that respect when he died for his country,” Barnett said. “I felt that that is a knife in the heart, a knife in the back. The lies that they told were unnecessary and there’s no point to, and it completed no mission to lie to me and it’s just heartbreaking.”
The gold star father added that no one has been held accountable for the deaths of these service members.
“No one has been moved from one post to another, they haven’t gone down to a lower post, they haven’t been removed from whatever office and put in another one and they sure haven’t been impeached or resigned. And that does not sit well,” the father said. (RELATED: ‘Incompetent, Cowards, Evil’: Gold Star Mother Breaks Down In Tears Describing Son’s Death In Afghanistan)
The parents also condemned White House National Security spokesperson John Kirby for saying he saw no chaos in Afghanistan. Barnett said Kirby should have spoken to witnesses “to get a better perspective.”
Hoover and Barnett have called on General Mark Milley, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other officials who carried out the withdrawal to be fired and held accountable. Although Milley advised the president the withdrawal could be catastrophic, the parents said the officials should not be exonerated.
“No, it does not. In fact, in my mind, that makes it even worse for them because they didn’t stand up for their men in order to do the job the right way. They weren’t doing it right. They could’ve said nope, it’s not going to end this way and fought the president a little bit harder and at the end of the day, they didn’t care for their men,” Hoover said.
“Yeah, why didn’t they fight for their men? Why didn’t they resign if they were so in disagreement with it, why didn’t they fight and why didn’t they resign? They should’ve done something,” Barnett added.
Hoover lamented the lack of accountability in an interview with Fox News in September 2022, which followed the anniversary of his son’s death.