As is my usual custom, I didn't bother staying up to watch Joe Biden blunder his way through his State of the Union Speech last night. (We forced Beege to do it.) But while browsing through some of the lowlights this morning, one disruption caught my eye. After the President made a patently false statement about America being "safer" under his presidency, Biden was briefly interrupted by someone in the gallery who started shouting at him. Such disruptions are sadly not all that uncommon these days, but this man's commentary was oddly specific. He shouted out "Abbey Gate! Second Battalion, First Marines!" That is the location outside of the airport in Kabul where 13 Marines were killed in an ambush during Biden's disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021. The person doing the shouting was Steve Nikoui, the father of one of the Marines who died that day. Mr. Nikoui was removed from the chamber, but that apparently wasn't good enough for the White House. He was placed under arrest and taken into custody. (NY Post)

The heckler who shouted at President Biden during his State of the Union address Thursday night was identified as the father of a fallen Marine — and later arrested over the disruption.

“America’s safer today than when I took office,” Biden, 81, was in the middle of saying before he was interrupted from the chamber’s balcony.

“Abbey Gate!” Steve Nikoui yelled down at the president. “Second Battalion, First Marines!”

Capitol Police escorted Nikoui, 51, out of the chamber at around 10:15 p.m. and took him into custody.

I'm not here to encourage anyone to disrupt official events like the SOTU address or to excuse such activities. But we should all be able to sympathize with a Gold Star father who lost his son because of the senseless incompetence on display during that withdrawal. Listening to the Commander-in-Chief who was responsible for giving the orders that led to the untimely death of Lance Cpl. Kareem Nikoui bragging about how well he's done his job was probably simply too much for the Marine's father to bear.

Mr. Nikoui was charged with "crowding, obstructing, or incommoding Congress." It's a misdemeanor that typically brings a $50 fine with the person being released quickly after removal. But it's worth noting that other people shouted during the SOTU speech. They included members of Congress such as Marjorie Taylor Greene, despite Speaker Mike Johnson's warnings not to disrupt the event. You'll notice that she wasn't arrested. Nor were any of the Democrats who interrupted the speech by clapping like seals every time Biden paused in his remarks. That was another unsubtle reminder that there are two sets of rules in Washington. One set applies to the hoi polloi looking on from the sidelines and the other is for the elites who hold power. Don't forget your place, peasants.

To their credit, Joe Biden and the First Lady did attend the dignified transfer of the remains of the Marines when they were returned home, despite rumors to the contrary. But we didn't hear much more from Uncle Joe about it. Last night, Congressman Darrell Issa told reporters that he has offered meetings with multiple Gold Star families of the fallen Marines to the White House, but he has been "rebuffed." 

Joe Biden has been the author of multiple catastrophic failures during his first three years in office. There are far too many to list them all here and the nation continues to pay a price for his policies each and every day. But the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan was certainly among the worst. There's never really been any accountability for that debacle and Joe Biden has never even admitted his abject failure. One of the other Gold Star fathers who was at the SOTU address told reporters that Biden "knew — damn good and well — that Afghanistan was going to fall." That's already been confirmed. When Biden famously tried to claim that nobody told him he could have left a holding force behind until the withdrawal was complete, the Pentagon publicly rebuffed him. That failure will remain one of the darkest hours of Dark Brandon's presidency.