As she marked the 14th anniversary of the abduction of her son, Austin Tice, during a 2012 reporting trip to Syria, Debra Tice remained in recovery following her own multi-month health scare.
Last October, CNN interviewed a former advisor to ousted Syrian president Bashar al-Assad who told the outlet that Tice, a veteran Marine Corps captain and freelance reporter, had died in 2013. Debra Tice describes the event as a “crash” that sent her health into a tailspin. She became unable to eat, losing weight and becoming so weak she couldn’t leave the house, she said. Gastroenterologists and other physicians, she said, ultimately concluded that her symptoms were based in trauma, not disease.
Beyond the reports that her son was dead, Tice said she was blindsided by a wave of condolence cards and messages, not only to her, but also to her other six children.
“It was the first time that they had all kind of been pinged, and a lot of it was kindness,” Tice told Military Times on Aug. 14, the day after the anniversary. “But, this mom was like, ‘Don’t touch my children.’”
Tice rejects the account of Assad’s advisor, Bassam Al-Hassan, noting that he failed an FBI polygraph. No physical proof exists that Austin Tice is no longer alive.
The Tice family has in recent months called for an investigation of the possibility that Austin was moved from Syria to Iran under the control of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, which has managed some secret detention facilities in Syria. They’ve emphasized that they want the U.S. to reach out to Iran amid negotiations over the ongoing conflict to ask for full information sharing on Austin’s case.
“Our government needs to be asking what they know about Austin every time they’re with them [at the negotiating table],” she said.
For Debra Tice, the next objective is clear: meet in person with Jay Clayton, the newly confirmed director of National Intelligence, who was sworn in earlier this month.
“I really don’t know anything about him, but I just wanted to share with him how important his role is in getting Austin out,” she said.
Recently departed DNI Tulsi Gabbard had taken the unprecedented step of allowing the Tice family to review all the information the government had collected on Austin – eight four-inch binders covering the period from his abduction to October 2024, she said. In addition to various documented medical issues and times Austin had been moved, Tice said, she saw what she believes is evidence that he could have been recovered by the State Department shortly after he was first abducted.
To date, Tice said, she has only ever met with one Secretary of State: Antony Blinken, who in 2024 offered a $10 million bounty for information about Austin’s whereabouts. Debra Tice maintains that decision was unhelpful because it tends to flood channels with bad info.
She’d like Clayton, the new DNI, to open the binders again and show the family anything learned since October 2024. She’s also hoping to make international trips: she’d like to connect with Israel’s office of the national coordinator for hostages and the missing, an office parallel to the State Department’s special presidential envoy for hostage affairs. She also hopes to make a second trip to Syria, she said, as well as a new journey to the Vatican to meet with Pope Leo XIV.
“I’m just getting everything warmed up again,” Tice said, “And reminding people that, you know, I’m still trying to find my son.”
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