President Joe Biden during a ceremony at the White House on Tuesday, Sept. 5, 2023, places the Medal of Honor around retired Army helicopter pilot Capt. Larry Taylor, who was recognized for his heroic actions during the Vietnam War when led a mission in 1968 to save a small group of soldiers trapped in a rice field by enemy fire. (Carlos Bongioanni/Stars and Stripes)
WASHINGTON (Tribune News Service) — Conservative commentators panned President Joe Biden for departing a Vietnam veteran’s Medal of Honor ceremony Tuesday before the closing benediction.
The White House said Biden’s departure was a planned move, after his wife tested positive for COVID-19, to minimize close contact with attendees who were about to participate in the reception that followed. As of Thursday, the White House said, Biden was still testing negative for the virus as he prepared to depart for a summit in India.
On Tuesday, Biden spent time, masked, with Signal Mountain’s Larry Taylor, before awarding the Army pilot the Medal of Honor for saving four men in Vietnam in 1968. The president then presided unmasked over the roughly 16-minute ceremony at the White House before dignitaries and supporters of Taylor. After sharing a handshake and a salute with Taylor, Biden departed before the closing benediction, a break from past custom.
Critics rejected the White House’s explanation and said Biden’s departure demonstrated confusion on his part or disrespect for Taylor — though no attendees of the ceremony told the Chattanooga Times Free Press they felt this way.
The White House announced Sept. 1 that Joe Biden would be awarding Taylor the medal early this week.
Biden then spent the weekend touring hurricane-damaged Florida and at a family home in Delaware with his wife. Then late Monday night, the White House announced the first lady had tested positive for COVID-19.
She remained in Delaware. The president has not experienced symptoms and has repeatedly tested negative for the virus since, according to the White House.
Early Tuesday afternoon, Taylor left the Sheraton Pentagon City Hotel, walking through a lobby full of people who had gathered, to be taken to the White House by charter bus to attend his Medal of Honor ceremony.
Prior to the ceremony, Biden met with Taylor and his family privately to thank him, and they were masked during that time, said Dhara Nayyar, the White House’s senior regional communications director, in an email Thursday to the Times Free Press.
Guests had already taken their places in the White House’s East Room when the event began and Taylor and Biden — both masked — walked next to one another down a center aisle toward the stage.
President Joe Biden during a ceremony at the White House on Tuesday, Sept. 5, 2023, removes his face mask after arriving for a Medal of Honor ceremony for retired Army helicopter pilot Capt. Larry Taylor who received the nation’s highest military award for valor for his heroic actions during the Vietnam War when he led a mission in 1968 to save a small group of soldiers trapped in a rice field by enemy fire. (Carlos Bongioanni/Stars and Stripes)
Upon reaching the stage, both removed their masks and Taylor went to sit in a distant chair as Biden of how the former Army pilot saved four men’s lives in a daring helicopter maneuver in Vietnam in June 1968. When it came time to present the Medal of Honor, Biden approached Taylor, and the two stood together as the medal citation was read aloud.
After Biden placed the medal around Taylor’s neck, the crowd applauded and the two shook hands and saluted. Biden then left Taylor on the stage, walking down the aisle and leaving the room during the period before the closing benediction was read. In past Medal of Honor ceremonies reviewed by the Times Free Press, Biden has remained on stage during the benediction.
In statements in a news conference Wednesday and to the Times Free Press directly, White House officials maintained Biden’s decision to leave following the salute was planned out of an abundance of caution — a claim critics online said disrespected their intelligence, given that Biden had just been standing so close to Taylor, unmasked.
Despite his many negative tests and lack of symptoms, Biden “still wanted to be cognizant of his exposure regarding the virus,” Nayyar, the White House spokesperson, said in an email.
“He removed his mask to deliver powerful remarks about Capt. Taylor’s service to our nation and for a brief period afterwards,” Nayyar said. “And then, as planned, he left during a pause in the program in order to minimize his close contact with attendees who were about to participate in the reception.”
Following the ceremony, the Times Free Press asked several attendees if anything stood out.
Leroy Petry, the president of the Congressional Medal of Honor Society, who received the medal himself in 2011, approvingly noted officials gave Taylor a chair and that there seemed to be a lot of room made for family and friends.
One veteran at the reception said he wished Biden had acknowledged his buddy J.O. Ratliff, Taylor’s co-pilot during the daring action in Vietnam 55 years ago for which Taylor was honored.
No one mentioned the fact that Biden did not stay for the benediction.
Within hours of the ceremony, stories on this and other themes emerged online.
“Biden ripped for leaving Medal of Honor ceremony early: ‘ABHORRENT,’” said a Fox News headline, citing social media posts from conservative writers and activists saying Biden “bolted” from the ceremony.
Another article suggested Biden was not sufficiently cautious with Taylor, given the medical risk.
“COVID-exposed Biden flouts White House mask rule as he stands just inches away from elderly Medal of Honor vet,” said the New York Post.
Medal of Honor recipient retired Army helicopter pilot Capt. Larry Taylor leaves a White House ceremony in his honor on Tuesday, Sept. 5, 2023, after he was recognized for his heroic actions during the Vietnam War when led a mission in 1968 to save a small group of soldiers trapped in a rice field by enemy fire. (Carlos Bongioanni/Stars and Stripes)
Through a mediator, Taylor, 81, did not respond to a request for comment by press time.
Also in attendance at the White House on Tuesday was Dave Hill, the lone survivor among the four men Taylor saved on June 18, 1968, and a in the appeal effort to get Taylor the medal.
Reached by phone Wednesday evening, Hill said Biden didn’t have to approve Taylor’s Medal of Honor and he was grateful the president did so. Hill thought Biden seemed poised Tuesday, and he said neither he nor any of the Army veterans with whom he attended the ceremony thought anything of Biden’s mode of departure.
“It was totally unimportant to us,” Hill said.
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