The 20-year-old National Guard member shot near the White House on Wednesday has died, President Donald Trump announced during a live speech on Thursday evening.
Trump, who is spending Thanksgiving at Mar-a-Lago, announced Army Specialist Sarah Beckstrom’s death during a live-streamed call with service members.
Praising Beckstrom as “magnificent” and “outstanding,” the president, 79, said he had heard of her passing just moments before his address and stated plainly, “She’s dead. Not with us.”
Trump began his speech by speaking of the “anguish and the horror of our entire nation at the terrorist attack yesterday,” noting that the targeted National Guard members had been deployed as part of his task force to clamp down on crime in the capital. He claimed that “until yesterday, we literally had no incidents for many months.”
He then said, “I must unfortunately tell you that just seconds before I went on, right now, I heard that Sarah Beckstrom of West Virginia, one of the guardsmen that we’re talking about, highly respected, young, magnificent person, started service in June of 2023, outstanding in every way, she’s just passed away,” the president said.
“She’s no longer with us. She’s looking down on us right now. Her parents are with her. This just happened. She was savagely attacked. She’s dead. Not with us,” he continued. “Incredible person. Outstanding in every single way in every department. It’s horrible.”
The White House’s RapidResponse47 X account said Trump spoke with Beckstrom’s parents Thursday evening.
Earlier in the day, Beckstrom’s father told The New York Times that she had suffered a “mortal wound” and would not recover.
A gunman opened fire on Beckstrom and Air Force Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24, both of whom are members of the West Virginia National Guard, on Wednesday afternoon.
Wolfe remains in critical condition, with Trump saying he is “fighting for his life, he’s in very bad shape.”
He added that “the monster that did this” is in “serious condition.” The suspected shooter, 29-year-old Rahmanullah Lakanwal, had been taken into custody at the scene of the shooting and transported to a hospital.
West Virginia Governor Patrick Morrisey, who initially announced that both guardsmen had died before walking back that statement on Wednesday, addressed Beckstrom’s death on Thursday evening, writing on X, “This is not the result we hoped for, but it is the result we all feared.”
“Sarah served with courage, extraordinary resolve, and an unwavering sense of duty to her state and to her nation. She answered the call to serve, stepped forward willingly, and carried out her mission with the strength and character that define the very best of the West Virginia National Guard,” he wrote.
Beckstrom hails from Summersville—a town of fewer than 4,000 residents—and joined the service in 2023. She and Wolfe were both deployed to D.C. in mid-August, when Trump declared a crime emergency.
The West Virginia National Guard’s X account confirmed Beckstrom’s passing Thursday evening, writing that she died “by wounds incurred during the shooting.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Attorney General Pam Bondi both posted tributes to Beckstrom.
“There WILL BE JUSTICE for Sarah,” Bondi wrote, adding “Thank you to President Trump—the death penalty is back.”
Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, said during a Thursday morning press conference that Lakanwal will face first-degree murder charges if either service member does not survive.
After the announcement of Beckstrom’s death, Pirro remembered her as a “hero” in an X post, before declaring, “It is now time to avenge her death and secure justice.”
When asked by a reporter if he was planning to attend Beckstrom’s funeral, the commander-in-chief replied that it was something he could “conceive of,” before immediately talking about his winning margin in the state.
“I haven’t thought about it yet, but it certainly is something I could conceive of. I love West Virginia. You know, I won West Virginia by one of the biggest margins of any president anywhere and these are great people,” he said. “I haven’t given it any thought but it sounds like something I could do.”
