The White House press briefing on Monday got heated fast after Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt lit into reporters, accusing major outlets of purposely ignoring the murder of Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska.
Zarutska, 23, fled Ukraine in 2022 after Russia’s invasion, only to be stabbed to death on August 22 while riding home from her pizzeria job. Surveillance footage released earlier this month shows 34-year-old Decarlos Brown Jr. sitting behind her, suddenly pulling a pocketknife, and stabbing her in the neck three times. No confrontation. No words exchanged—just a brutal, random attack.
Brown, whose rap sheet reads like a broken record of the justice system failing, has had 14 arrests since 2007. His record includes armed robbery, multiple felonies, domestic violence, and a string of skipped bonds. Earlier this year, he was arrested for calling 911 to say people were “controlling his body.” Despite documented schizophrenia, he was cut loose on a written promise to appear in court.
Leavitt, who didn’t hold back in what’s already being called a “mic drop” moment, said the press corps had no problem spending months dragging Daniel Penny — the Marine vet charged and later acquitted for putting Jordan Neely in a fatal chokehold on the NYC subway — but went radio silent when Zarutska was killed on a Charlotte light rail.
Leavitt condemned what she described as delayed media attention to the case, which only gained widespread coverage after graphic surveillance footage spread across social media.
“This is madness. This monster should have been locked up, and Iryna should still be alive, but Democrat politicians, liberal judges, and weak prosecutors would rather virtue signal than lock up criminals and protect their communities,” she said. “Perhaps most shamefully of all, the majority of the media … decided that her murder was not worth reporting on originally because it does not fit a preferred narrative.”
Leavitt drew a direct comparison to the 2023 Daniel Penny case in New York City, when the Marine veteran was charged with manslaughter after fatally restraining Jordan Neely on a subway. Penny was acquitted in December 2024, but the case dominated national headlines.
“Many of the journalists in this room spilled plenty of ink, trying to smear Daniel Penny … but none of those same reporters lift a finger to write stories about an actual murderer,” Leavitt told the press corps.
She went on to tie Zarutska’s death to broader criticisms of Democratic-backed bail reform policies: “Too many innocent people across the country continue to pay the price of the failed experiment known as cashless bail.”
The DOJ isn’t letting this one slide. On Monday, Attorney General Pam Bondi announced federal charges against Brown for causing death on a mass transit system — a charge that could land him in prison for life, or even face the death penalty.
“We will seek the maximum penalty for this unforgivable act of violence,” Bondi said. “He will never again see the light of day as a free man.”
The real spark here is the side-by-side comparison with Daniel Penny. Back in May 2023, Penny restrained Jordan Neely, a homeless man with a history of mental illness, in a chokehold on the subway. Neely died, Penny was charged with manslaughter, and the case blew up into a culture war grenade. By December 2024, Penny walked free after being acquitted — but not before becoming a symbol for everything from vigilantism to racial justice to “what would you do in that situation?”
Now, conservatives are throwing Zarutska’s murder into the conversation as Exhibit A. The rallying cry making the rounds: “Without Daniel Penny, you get Iryna Zarutska.” Translation: prosecutions like Penny’s scare people away from stepping in, and tragedies like this are the result.
Here’s the thing: the Zarutska case didn’t go viral because of the nightly news — it blew up because the video hit X (formerly Twitter) and got boosted by figures like Elon Musk and Charlie Kirk. Only then did major outlets pick it up, some framing coverage around Republicans “politicizing” the murder, which ironically fed right back into Leavitt’s “media bias” critique.
CNN’s Brian Stelter compared the social media attention to how civil rights groups amplified police brutality cases, but warned about the ugly, racist takes flooding replies.
President Donald Trump also addressed Zarutska’s killing, both in a statement posted on X and in remarks delivered Monday at the Museum of the Bible in Washington.
“I have seen the horrific video of a beautiful, young Ukrainian refugee, who came to America to escape the vicious War in Ukraine … and was brutally ambushed by a mentally deranged lunatic,” Trump said in the statement. “The perpetrator was a well known career criminal, who had been previously arrested and released on CASHLESS BAIL in January, a total of 14 TIMES. What the hell was he doing riding the train, and walking the streets? Criminals like this need to be LOCKED UP.”
Speaking later to a live audience, Trump called Zarutska’s killing a reminder of the dangers posed by repeat offenders. “A lunatic just got up and started,” he said of the attack. “It’s right on tape. Not really watchable because it’s so horrible, but just viciously stabbed. She’s just sitting there.”
Trump linked the Charlotte case to his administration’s ongoing push against cashless bail, calling it a failed policy that puts violent offenders back on the streets. “This cashless bail started a wave in our country where a killer kills somebody and is out on the street by the afternoon … going out and killing again,” he said.
Court records obtained by Fox News Digital show that Brown’s criminal record stretches back over a decade. He was convicted of felony larceny and felony breaking and entering in 2013 and later served more than six years in prison for robbery with a dangerous weapon. He was released in 2020 and remained on parole until 2021.
Brown was arrested shortly after Zarutska’s death and has been charged with first-degree murder.
The case has fueled renewed debate over bail reform, crime prevention, and the role of media coverage in shaping public perception of violent crime. Conservatives, including Trump and Leavitt, argue that Democratic policies have created a revolving door in the justice system.
Democrats and civil rights advocates, meanwhile, have defended bail reform as necessary to prevent unfair pretrial detention. However, critics say the policies have allowed dangerous offenders to slip through the system.
While national outlets have since covered Zarutska’s murder, some framed the attention as part of a Republican political strategy — a framing that Leavitt and other White House officials say reinforces their point about selective media narratives.
