Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, the West Virginia National Guard member critically wounded in an ambush by an Afghan refugee near the White House, got out of bed for the first time Tuesday — a miracle milestone doctors once said was nearly impossible.
President Donald Trump shared the uplifting news during his Tuesday night rally in Mount Pocono, Pennsylvania, and described Wolfe’s recovery as nothing short of miraculous.
“And today I got a call that he got up from bed. Do you believe that? He got up, he got up,” Trump told the crowd. “Now, he didn’t speak. He’s not ready for that yet. But he got up.”
The West Virginia National Guard called Wolfe’s progress “a Christmas miracle” in an update posted Tuesday.
Wolfe, 24, was shot multiple times on November 26 when 29-year-old Afghan refugee Rahmanullah Lakanwal ambushed him and fellow National Guard member Army Spc. Sarah Beckstrom, 20, as they patrolled Washington, D.C. just two blocks from the White House.
Beckstrom died from her injuries the next day. Wolfe was rushed to a hospital in critical condition with doctors giving him almost no chance of survival.
But Trump said Wolfe’s mother, Melody, never wavered in her faith that her son would recover.
“The night that he was so badly hit and the doctors gave him almost no chance,” Trump said. “She said, ‘sir, he’s fine.’ It was amazing, actually.”
“And then she called to say, ‘Sir, he moved his finger today.’ This is like three days later — ‘he moved his finger,'” Trump said.
“Last night mom was near the head of the bed and Andy put his arm around her neck and patted her on the back of the head,” the National Guard said in a statement. “He was comforting his mom and I think telling her that he was coming back to them.”
Tuesday morning, Wolfe smiled at his nurse when she spoke to him.
Maj. Gen. Jim Seward provided an update to Trump at a White House event Sunday.
“When a nurse was leaving shift (Saturday) she said ‘Goodbye Andrew!’ and he’s got a big mitt on his left hand because if he didn’t he would remove every cord on his body, but he raised his mitt and [waved] a couple of times,” Seward said.
“He’s not speaking to us yet, but our prayer is that every day there’ll be another miracle and more progress to inspire the staff and inspire the prayers around the country,” Seward said.
Lakanwal, the suspected attacker, entered the United States in September 2021 under President Joe Biden’s Operation Allies Welcome, a program allowing vulnerable Afghan refugees to enter following the U.S. military’s choatic withdrawal from Afghanistan.
He worked with the CIA for more than a decade in Afghanistan before coming to the United States, according to CIA Director John Ratcliffe.