The wife of a sailor trapped aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln has blasted President Donald Trump’s dismissive response to the increasingly dire conditions on the aircraft carrier, calling on the president to show some “sympathy” and “accountability” for the service members stuck at sea.
“I don’t think the man thinks before he talks,” the woman, whose identity was not revealed, told Jake Tapper in a phone interview on CNN Friday.
“I was really hoping at some point there would be a redemption. Try to redeem yourself at least a little bit,” she said, addressing Trump.
“Have some sympathy, some empathy, take some accountability for what’s going on with your military, your ship, your war,” she continued. “It’s infuriating.”
Her comments came just hours after Trump brushed off concerns from military families about the sailors’ extended deployment. Asked on Friday whether family members were worried about conditions aboard the ship, Trump, who has never served in the military, replied: “No, they’re not.”
When he was asked whether the deployment had gone on too long, given the conditions and mental health risks, the president responded: “No, no, no. Not nearly long enough.”
The sailor’s wife told Tapper that her husband’s experience aboard the ship has been radically different from Trump’s characterization.
She compared the sailors on the ship, which has been floating in the Arabian Sea during Trump’s war with Iran, to being “stuck in a floating metal prison in the middle of the water, eating prison-like food with the same people in the same bunk beds in the same small quarters for 200 days, 250 days. You start to go a little insane.”
“I’m appalled at the conditions on this ship,” she said.
The woman pointed out that this is not her husband’s first deployment aboard a Navy ship, meaning he knows how the vessels are supposed to operate.
“It is the worst deployment he’s ever been on,” she said. “He also said the food’s been appalling. It’s been appalling the whole time... It’s not only the quality but the quantity, the rationing, the portions.”
She added: “It hurts my heart as his wife to know that he’s going through that.”
The Lincoln has been deployed for more than 260 days, with reports of food and supply shortages, poor maintenance, broken plumbing, mold and growing mental health concerns among sailors. The ship has also been the subject of reports about sailors attempting to go overboard.
The sailor’s wife said the stress and 12-hour workdays were taking a serious toll on her husband’s mental health.
“My husband is a very leave-it-at-work type of person,” she told Tapper. While he “works very hard for the United States military,” he usually “lets it go at work.”
“But he even said he finds himself changing; he feels himself angrier and more frustrated. That’s very unlike him. It’s very hard to hear that as his wife,” she added.
She sends him “care packages” and photos of their children in a desperate bid to “boost his morale.”
The Daily Beast has reached out to the White House for comment.
The Trump administration has pushed back forcefully against reports of poor conditions aboard the Lincoln.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called the reporting “completely misrepresented,” while Acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao said sailors had been pushed to their limits but “have never broken.”
Military families, however, have continued to demand answers. Some 200 relatives attended a town hall last week with Cao and other senior military officials, calling for changes.
