The Air Force will extend military funeral honors to Ashli Babbitt, the Air Force veteran shot and killed by a security officer as she climbed through a broken window during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C.
Babbitt served 5 years on active duty in the Air Force and several years in the Air National Guard, a service record that entitled her to a basic level of funeral military honors under federal law, including a folded flag presented to next of kin and a bugler to play Taps. But a request from her family for those honors at her 2021 funeral was denied by then-Lt. Gen. Brian Kelly, the deputy chief of staff for Manpower, Personnel and Services.
But Undersecretary of the Air Force Matthew Lohmeier overturned that decision earlier this month. In a letter to Babbitt’s family released by lawyers with Judicial Watch who supported her appeal, Lohmeier wrote that “after reviewing the circumstances of Ashli’s death. and considering the information that has come forward since then, I am persuaded that the previous determination was incorrect.”
In 2021, Kelly disallowed those honors, noting in a letter to Babbitt’s family that she “was fatally shot after having illegally entered the United States Capitol Building on 6 January 2021. As a result. I have determined that military funeral honors would bring discredit upon the Air Force.”
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