The former Oakmont teacher who triumphantly returned to the U.S. last month in an extraordinary homecoming after more than three years of captivity in Russian prisons will attend Tuesday’s joint session of Congress.
Marc Fogel, who was arrested at a Moscow airport in August 2021 for taking prescribed medical marijuana into the country, will be a guest of First Lady Melania Trump as her husband, President Donald Trump, the architect of his release, delivers the first address of his administration to Congress.
Fogel will be joined by his mother, Malphine Fogel, 95, of Butler Township, who lobbied first the Biden administration and then Trump to bring her son home.
Her wish came true on Feb. 11 when U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff flew to Russia on his private jet and returned Fogel to the United States.
That night, Fogel, who has taught in Malaysia, Colombia, Oman and Venezuela, met Trump at the White House.
Clutching a can of Iron City beer and with an American flag around his neck, Fogel spoke for a few minutes from the Diplomatic Reception Room.
As he met Pennsylvania’s congressional delegation, Fogel said, “I feel like the luckiest man on earth right now.”
Fogel spent that night in Washington, D.C., before heading to San Antonio, Texas, where he received a full medical checkup at Brooke Army Medical Center at Fort Sam Houston.
Fogel returned to Western Pennsylvania a week later.
According to a news release issued by the White House, Fogel and his mother will join 13 others as Melania Trump’s guests on Tuesday to highlight her husband’s priorities.
Among them will be the wife and daughters of Corey Comperatore, the firefighter killed in the assassination attempt on Trump at a July 13 rally in Butler County.
That event is where Malphine Fogel first met with Trump. When the president spoke with Marc Fogel at the White House on Feb. 11, Trump said of Malphine, “She made quite an impression.”