WASHINGTON – On Tuesday, the first day of the partial federal government shutdown, Rep. Spencer Bachus, R-Vestavia Hills, escorted a group of World War II veterans to through the World War II Memorial on the National Mall in defiance of the National Park Service.
With the assistance of Bachus and other lawmakers, the group of World War II veterans knocked over the barriers at the memorial and gained access to the site.
“The America that I have known would have welcomed our WWII Veterans with open arms and spared no effort to make their tour of the monument as pleasant and honorable as possible,” Bachus said in a statement. “For them to be greeted by barricades is not the America that our forefathers left us.”
Bachus escorted Barbour County native Raymond Stanley, who had entered the Army in 1943 and served two and a half years in England, France and Germany.
The group was a part of the Honor Flight organization, which is a program that provides transports veterans to memorials in Washington, D.C.
WWII veterans storm closed DC memorial. This is awesome. RT @LeoShane: The vets have control of the memorial. pic.twitter.com/v1kqCSteUv
— Clay Travis (@ClayTravisBGID) October 1, 2013
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