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EXCLUSIVE — The father of Staff Sgt. Darin “Taylor” Hoover — one of the 13 U.S. service members killed in the Abbey Gate bombing during the chaotic 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan — is blasting the former Biden administration after an Afghan national allegedly shot two National Guardsmen just blocks from the White House.
Hoover gave Fox News Digital a new, forceful statement on Wednesday’s shooting, saying the incident was the direct result of the administration’s failed vetting of Afghan evacuees.
“This is on the feckless Biden administration,” Hoover said of the shooting. “We had no idea who was getting into this country because the Biden administration, especially the State Department run by Antony Blinken, didn’t do the work that was needed to vet all these people. There were so many people put on the planes that got out initially, that we have no idea who they were.”
He continued: “By doing this, all we got is men of fighting age that are most likely terrorists that are here in the homeland to do us all harm and take our beloved United States of America. Maybe if the Biden administration started the process earlier than the truncated timetable that they did, this could have all come out so much better, including all of our most precious men and women of our military coming home.”
Former President Joe Biden is under fire from Gold Star families like the Hoovers after an Afghan national allegedly ambushed and shot two National Guardsmen in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday. (Darin Hoover, Getty Images)
The FBI is leading the investigation into the shooting, and multiple intelligence sources tell Fox News Digital the attack is being treated as a possible act of international terrorism. The suspect, identified as 29-year-old Afghan national Rahmanullah Lakanwal, was taken into custody after allegedly ambushing the two West Virginia National Guardsmen near the White House.
Fox News Digital previously reported that Lakanwal entered the United States in September 2021 under Operation Allies Welcome, immediately following the fall of Kabul, and that he had worked with several U.S. government entities, including the CIA, as part of a partner force in Kandahar.
“The individual — and so many others — should have never been allowed to come here,” former CIA Director John Ratcliffe told Fox News Digital. “Our citizens and service members deserve far better than to endure the ongoing fallout from the Biden administration’s catastrophic failures.”
Aug 29, 2023: Darin Hoover and Kelly Barnett, parents of Marine Corps Staff Sergeant Taylor Hoover, speak to a House committee. (Fox News)
Hoover says the shooting confirms what he and other Gold Star parents feared when thousands of Afghans were evacuated during the final days of the withdrawal — that many individuals were allowed into the United States without adequate screening.
“We had no idea who Biden put on those planes,” Hoover said. “None.”
Wednesday’s comments come after years of public criticism from Hoover, who has been one of the most vocal parents demanding accountability for the Abbey Gate attack that killed 13 American service members, including his son Taylor, an 11-year Marine veteran who was engaged to be married and on his third deployment to Afghanistan.
Staff Sgt. Darin Taylor Hoover was killed in action in Afghanistan on August 26, 2021. He is a Purple Heart recipient. (Darin Hoover)
Hoover’s earlier remarks made headlines in 2024, when he reacted to President Biden falsely claiming during a presidential debate that no U.S. service members had died under his watch. At the time, Hoover told Fox News Digital that he felt “rage” hearing Biden deny the deaths of the Abbey Gate 13.
“The rage, the absolute disgust that I got from hearing him say that — I started yelling back at the TV,” he said in 2024. “He’s never acknowledged, not one time, any of our kids. He’s never said their names.”
He also revealed then that the Biden administration sent the Abbey Gate families a batch of identical condolence letters a year after the attack.
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“All 13 families got a canned letter,” he said in a 2024 Fox News Digital interview. “It looked like it was a photocopy. We’ve had absolutely nothing before, nothing since.”
Hoover’s frustration at being unable to secure a meeting with Biden was also part of that earlier reporting.
“[Biden] doesn’t want to deal with us,” Hoover said in 2024. “He knows that we’re in his face, but he doesn’t want to deal with us.”
But Hoover told Fox News Digital this week that Wednesday’s shooting, allegedly carried out by an Afghan national allowed into the country during the withdrawal, is a devastating new chapter. To him, it demonstrates that the consequences of the troubled evacuation are still unfolding on American soil.
Federal officials say the investigation into the shooting remains active. Hoover says he will continue speaking out until the families of the Abbey Gate fallen receive answers — and until the former administration takes responsibility for what he believes are ongoing failures.
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“This isn’t going away,” he said at the time. “We’re not going away.”
Fox News Digital’s Brooke Singman contributed to this report.