WATCH: McCollum Family Declined to Meet President Biden
The family of Rylee McCollum appeared on Fox News Tuesday Morning to speak about their boy and, in doing so, Rylee's father Jim revealed that he opted not to meet with President Biden.
Many critics of the president said that the way in which he pulled out of Afghanistan was haphazard, irresponsible, and dangerous. The result of his decision, according to some, left 13 U.S. servicemen dead, including McCollum. Though President Biden did reach out to the McCollum family, Jim said that he opted not to meet with him.
"I actually declined the meeting with the president," Jim said. "We went to a different room. When he came, we went to a separate room. I had no desire to meet with the president."
The Fox News anchor then simply asked Jim, 'Why?'
"The way he has handled this, everything he's done, every step of the way, has been absolutely backwards, and I don't understand the process of how they came to the decisions that they made," Jim said. "A high school kid could make better decisions than they've made in this. They have fumbled the ball every step of the way."
Cheyenne McCollum, Rylee's sister, stated that she and Rylee's wife, Jiennah Crayton, did choose to meet the president for one specific reason.
"I chose to stay with my brother's wife," Cheyenne said. "She wanted the chance to look him in the eye and see if it was going to be a sincere conversation or apology. I was able to stand about 15 seconds of his fake, scripted apology, and I had to walk away."
Cheyenne continued, stating the president, "Would not look us in the eye. There was not an ounce of sympathy, looking on his face. He tapped [Jiennah] on the knee and said 'I know what you're going through, I lost my son."
"It was more about his son; my son wasn't mentioned," Jim stated. "It was his son and about him. And nothing to do with the 13."
Video of the interview can be seen below: