National Guard member dies after shooting in Washington, DC

Washington: A National Guard member has died of her wounds in hospital, US President Donald Trump has announced, just over 24 hours after she was shot along with a colleague two blocks from the White House.

“Sarah Beckstrom of West Virginia, one of the guardsmen that we’re talking about, highly respected, young, magnificent person ... She’s just passed away. She’s no longer with us,” Trump said in his first live remarks since the shooting on Wednesday (Thursday AEDT).

The man suspected of shooting Beckstrom, 20, and Andrew Wolfe, 24, also of West Virginia, drove across the United States with a plan to commit his crime, officials said, as they began a global investigation into what they are calling a terrorist act.

The suspect, 29-year-old Afghan national Rahmanullah Lakanwal, came to the US in 2021 as part of Operation Allies Welcome, a program to resettle vulnerable Afghans who assisted the US during its two-decade presence in the country after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

Central Intelligence Agency director John Ratcliffe told Fox News that Lakanwal worked with the US government, including the CIA, as a member of a partner force in the southern Afghanistan province of Kandahar, ending shortly before the final US evacuation in August 2021.

Multiple US media outlets including Reuters and CNN reported Lakanwal applied for asylum in December 2024 and that it was granted in April, citing administration officials.

Jeanine Pirro, the US attorney for the District of Columbia, said Lakanwal drove to Washington, DC, from the state of Washington – on the other side of the country – “with the intended target of coming to our nation’s capital”.

She described the assault as a brazen and targeted attack on National Guard troops. “A lone gunman opened fire without provocation, ambush style, armed with a .357 Smith & Wesson revolver,” she said.

The accused fired at one guard, who fell to the ground, then leant over and shot the guard again, Pirro alleged. He then shot the other guard “several times” before being shot and subdued by other nearby guards.

Wolfe remained in a critical condition on Thursday (Friday AEDT).

“As you know, the other young man is fighting for his life,” Trump said during a call with several service members. “He’s in very bad shape. He’s fighting for his life, and hopefully we’ll get better news with respect to him.”

Earlier, Gary Beckstrom, the father of Sarah, had warned that his daughter was unlikely to recover, The New York Times reported.

“I’m holding her hand right now,” he said when reached by phone. “She has a mortal wound. It’s not going to be a recovery.” He declined to talk further.

Before Beckstrom died, Pirro said the suspect stood to be charged with three counts of assault with intent to kill while armed, carrying a maximum jail sentence of 15 years, but these charges would be upgraded to first degree murder if either of the victims died.

She said the suspect’s motive was not yet clear. “There are areas we are looking into but not ready to say.”

FBI director Kash Patel said the agency was leading a broad-based international terrorism investigation that would probe the suspect’s associates in the US and overseas.

It has executed multiple search warrants, including a search of the suspect’s home in Bellingham, a small city in the north-west corner of the country, in Washington state. Pirro said Lakanwal lived with his wife and possibly five children.

The horrific crime, which took place in central Washington at 2.15pm on Wednesday (6.15am Thursday AEDT), has quickly prompted a backlash against the Biden administration’s intake of about 190,000 Afghans under Operation Allies Welcome and its successor program, Enduring Welcome.

Pirro called it an “absurd” process. “This is what happens in this country when people are allowed in who are not properly vetted,” she said.

Vice President JD Vance, who raised concerns about the resettlement of un-vetted Afghans in 2021, said friends had accused him of racism at the time. “It was a clarifying moment,” he said. “They shouldn’t have been in our country.”

US Citizenship and Immigration Services announced it had immediately stopped processing all requests related to Afghan nationals pending further review of security and vetting protocols.

President Donald Trump earlier ordered an additional 500 National Guard troops to the streets of Washington, and announced a review of all Afghans who arrived under the previous administration.

“We must now re-examine every single alien who has entered our country from Afghanistan under Biden, and we must take all necessary measures to ensure the removal of any alien from any country who does not belong here or add benefit to our country,” he said.

He later expanded on those comments, saying his administration would work to “permanently pause” migration from all “Third World Countries to allow the US system to fully recover”, without identifying any countries by name.

He also said he would end all federal benefits and subsidies for “non-citizens”, “denaturalise migrants who undermine domestic tranquility” and deport any foreign national deemed a public charge, security risk, or “non-compatible with Western civilisation”.

With Reuters

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