On January 6, 2021, Ashli Babbitt was fatally shot during an attack on the United States Capitol.[1] She was part of a mob of supporters of U.S. President Donald Trump who breached the United States Capitol building seeking to overturn his defeat in the 2020 presidential election.[2][3][4] Babbitt attempted to climb through a shattered window of a barricaded door, which led to her being shot in the shoulder/neck by a United States Capitol Police (USCP) officer.[5][6][7][8] After a USCP emergency response team administered aid, Babbitt was transported to Washington Hospital Center, where she later died.[9][10] The USCP deemed the shooting was "lawful and within Department policy" and "potentially saved Members (of Congress) and staff from serious injury and possible death".[11][12]
After Joe Biden won the 2020 United States presidential election,[13] then-incumbent Donald Trump pursued an aggressive and unprecedented[14] effort to overturn the election,[15][16] with support and assistance from his campaign, his proxies, his political allies, and many of his supporters. These efforts culminated in the United States Capitol attack on January 6, 2021, the day set for the Electoral College vote count.
Babbitt was raised in a mostly apolitical family near San Diego, California.[17] In 2004, she enlisted in the United States Air Force, where she served twelve years; while on active duty, she met her first husband, Staff Sgt. Timothy McEntee. Babbitt was deployed at least eight times by 2014,[18] including in Afghanistan, Iraq, Kuwait, and Qatar; from 2010, she served in the Air National Guard. Six of her years in service were spent in a "Capital Guardians" unit of the District of Columbia Air National Guard, whose mandate is to defend the Washington D.C. region and quell civil unrest.[19][17] In 2014 Babbitt served as a "mentor" to less-experienced airmen about to go on their first deployment.[20] She reached the rank of senior airman, a "relatively low rank" for a twelve-year veteran according to The Washington Post.[19][21][22][23]
From 2015 to 2017, near the end of her service, she supplemented her income by working as security at the Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant in Maryland. There, she met Aaron Babbitt, who would become her second husband. She filed for divorce from her first husband in 2018.[17]
In 2016, she faced criminal charges of reckless endangerment in Maryland after she repeatedly smashed her SUV into a vehicle being driven by a former girlfriend of Aaron Babbitt.[17][24] Citing ongoing harassment, the victim obtained multiple judicial orders forbidding Babbitt any contact with her.[24]
In 2018, Babbitt moved back to California with her second husband and they purchased a pool servicing business. She worked there with her brother and several other relatives.[17]