La David Johnson's Widow Says Donald Trump Made Her Cry in Phone Call After Niger Attack

President Donald Trump forgot U.S. Army Sgt. La David Johnson's name and made his widow, Myeshia Johnson, cry when he said her husband "knew what he signed up for" before he died in an ambush in Niger, Africa, the gold star widow said on Good Morning America Monday morning.

Myeshia confirmed that Trump lied about the account of the call, and defended Florida Representative Frederica Wilson's version of what the president said to the grieving family on October 17.

Wilson's account, she said, "was 100 percent correct," despite Trump's vehement denial and retaliatory attacks on the congresswoman who has known the family for years.

Within an hour of Johnson's appearance on the ABC morning show, President Trump tweeted, "I had a very respectful conversation with the widow of Sgt. La David Johnson, and spoke his name from beginning, without hesitation!"

But Myeshia Johnson remembers it differently, saying she began crying during the phone call when Trump was "stumbling on trying to remember" Johnson's name. She said Trump's forgetting Johnson's name during the call made her "very upset and hurt; it made me cry even worse." Trump later recalled the phone call as a "very nice conversation" when asked by a reporter about his words.

"It made me cry because I was very angry at the tone of his voice," Myeshia said about the phone call. "He didn't remember my husband's name."

Myeshia said she spoke to Trump on speakerphone as her family drove to the Miami airport to meet her husband's body. Wilson, a close friend of the family, heard Trump's words while riding with them. Trump called Wilson "wacky" and accused her of "secretly" listening to the phone call, sparking a he-said-she-said political dispute until Myeshia confirmed Wilson's story.

"Why would we fabricate something like that?" Myeshia said when asked about Trump's claim that Wilson lied when she accused the president of insensitive comments.

I had a very respectful conversation with the widow of Sgt. La David Johnson, and spoke his name from beginning, without hesitation!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 23, 2017

Myeshia confirmed Sunday that a Facebook post criticizing Wilson is fake, but supporters of Trump quickly circulated it as a sign that Wilson politicized the death.

"I didn't say what that congresswoman said; didn't say it all. She knows it," Trump said. "I had a very nice conversation with the woman, with the wife who was—sounded like a lovely woman. Did not say what the congresswoman said, and most people aren't too surprised to hear that."

The call to the Johnson family came nearly two weeks after the fatal Niger incident. U.S. officials have still not given details of the mission, which led to the deaths of four Green Berets. Johnson left behind a wife who is six months pregnant as well as a 2-year-old boy and a 6-year-old girl.

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