(Zero Hedge)—The left’s addiction to reflexively blaming conservatives was on full display this week as New Yorker writer Jane Mayer used the ambush shooting of two National Guard members near the White House on Wednesday to criticize the troops’ presence rather than condemn the alleged attacker, 29-year-old Afghan national Rahmanullah Lakanwal.
Mayer took to X within an hour of the broad daylight attack, while the wounded servicemen were still in critical condition, claiming the essential deployment “unnecessary.”
“This is so tragic, so unnecessary, these poor guardsmen should never have been deployed,” the anti-Trump journalist wrote. “I live in DC and watched as they had virtually nothing to do but pick up trash. It was for political show and at what a cost.”
This is so tragic, so unnecessary, these poor guardsmen should never have been deployed. I live in DC and watched as they had virtually nothing to do but pick up trash. It was for political show and at what a cost. https://t.co/ABkOHNHAvG
— Jane Mayer (@JaneMayerNYer) November 26, 2025
Mayer’s tweet drew instant fury from the White House, including Rapid Response X account branding the New Yorker writer a “sick, disgusting ghoul,” while affirming that the National Guard had “saved countless lives.” White House Communications Director Steven Cheung was even more fire and brimstone, writing, “Jane, respectfully, shut the fuck up for trying to politicize this tragedy. They were protecting DC and trying to make the nation’s capital safer.”
The National Guard’s presence was part of a necessary federal effort initiated when President Donald Trump ordered their deployment, along with other federal agents, starting August 11, after declaring a “crime emergency” to restore public safety. The intervention was demonstrably effective, according to D.C. police data. Combined violent crime dropped by 49% (from 180 to 92 incidents) in the 19 days following the deployment, compared to the same period the previous year.
However, the focus quickly shifted from Mayer to a deeper, more alarming national security failure.
Lakanwal was a former “partner force member” who worked with U.S. government entities, including the CIA. Federal sources characterized the calculated act against American personnel as a deliberate “ambush attack.”
Former CIA Director John Ratcliffe confirmed Lakanwal arrived in the U.S. just a month after then-President Joe Biden’s disastrous 2021 Afghanistan evacuation under “Operation Allies Welcome,” specifically because of his prior CIA affiliation.
“In the wake of the disastrous Biden withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Biden administration justified bringing the alleged shooter to the United States in September 2021 due to his prior work with the U.S. government, including CIA, as a member of a partner force in Kandahar, which ended shortly following the chaotic evacuation,” Ratcliffe told Fox News.
“The individual—and so many others—should have never been allowed to come here,” Ratcliffe added. “Our citizens and service members deserve far better than to endure the ongoing fallout from the Biden administration’s catastrophic failures.”
Shortly after the attack, Trump vowed the responsible “animal” would “pay a very steep price.”
“The animal that shot the two National Guardsmen, with both being critically wounded, and now in two separate hospitals, is also severely wounded, but regardless, will pay a very steep price,” Trump posted on Truth Social. “God bless our Great National Guard, and all of our Military and Law Enforcement. These are truly Great People. I, as President of the United States, and everyone associated with the Office of the Presidency, am with you!”
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