The father of a hero airman killed in President Donald Trump’s war on Iran has disputed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s account of his meeting with grieving families.
Hegseth, who would like to be called “Secretary of War,” brazenly claimed Thursday that the families of fallen service members urged him to press on with the war on Iran during a private meeting the day before.
“What I heard through tears, through hugs, through strength and through unbreakable resolve was the same from family after family. They said, ‘Finish this. Honor their sacrifice. Do not waver. Do not stop until the job is done,’” the former Fox News host said during a press briefing.
But the father of Tech. Sgt. Tyler Simmons, 28, one of the six crew members who were killed when their refueling aircraft crashed while supporting military operations in Iran, told a starkly different version of his encounter with Hegseth at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, where his son’s remains were received in a dignified transfer.
“I can’t speak for the other families. When he spoke to me, that was not something we talked about,” Charles Simmons told NBC News.
Asked if he said anything to Hegseth or Trump about keeping the war going, Simmons said, “No, I didn’t say anything along those lines.”
The 60-year-old music teacher from Columbus, Ohio, told the outlet he was grateful for the warmth Trump and Hegseth showed him and said he and Hegseth spoke mainly about Tyler. He said Trump teared up and hugged him.
Simmons said he told Hegseth, “I understand there’s a lot of peril that goes into making decisions like this, and I just certainly hope the decisions being made are necessary.”
In his interview with NBC News, Simmons said he has “questions” about the war, which has claimed the lives of at least 13 U.S. service members, and isn’t able to draw “definitive conclusions when I don’t have all the data.”
“Who wants war?” he added. “Sometimes it’s a necessity, and I just don’t know what’s going on.”
Simmons said he was “pleasantly surprised” by Trump and Hegseth’s compassion “because the perception is they don’t care, they’re going to do what they want to do.”
“I got to see a different side of them up close and personal,” he said.
The grieving father said his only son, who hoped to become a commercial airline pilot, had a “magnetic personality” and “illuminated” the rooms he walked into.
With his voice breaking, he said that Tyler had told him “how much he loved me” the last time they spoke, only a day before the deadly crash.
When reached for comment, Hegseth’s spokesman Sean Parnell told the Daily Beast in a statement: “Secretary Hegseth has the utmost respect for our Gold Star families and has pledged to honor the sacrifice of their loved ones. While at Dover, the Secretary spoke with each family of our fallen heroes and the details of each individual conversation remain private.”
White House spokeswoman Olivia Wales told the Daily Beast, “President Trump welcomed six of our fallen heroes home on Wednesday who made the ultimate sacrifice in support of the noble Operation Epic Fury. The President grieved with their incredible families, shared his love, and expressed the deep gratitude of our entire nation. These men and women gave up their lives in defense of our freedom, and President Trump will never forget their honorable service and selfless devotion. They represent the very best of America.”
Hegseth’s recounting of the families’ message mirrors remarks Trump made after meeting with the families of six other service members who were killed by an Iranian drone strike last month. The president claimed that “every single one” told him the same thing: “Finish the job, sir. Please, finish the job.”
A public official who overheard Trump’s meetings with the families told NBC News they didn’t hear any of them urge Trump to “finish the job” in Iran.
For Wednesday’s dignified transfer of the six U.S. Air Force airmen in Delaware, where Hegseth arrived chewing a mystery substance, their families explicitly requested privacy, banning cameras from capturing Trump welcoming the fallen service members back home.
While the press honored the families’ request, the White House apparently couldn’t resist turning the moment into a photo op for Trump, posting a photo of him saluting as a flag-draped casket is carried off.
Responding to a request for comment on Wednesday, an unnamed White House official emailed the Daily Beast through its press account, claiming that while the fallen soldiers’ families did not want press, they had signed off on official photography.
The same email account has previously shared incorrect information with the Daily Beast. For example, when Karoline Leavitt’s extended family was caught up in the ICE raids, an anonymous email from the same account claimed Leavitt’s nephew had been abandoned by her Brazilian-born mother, something the mom later furiously refuted.
