Walz’s Congressional Office Never Corrected Claims of Afghanistan Service After Vet Called Him Out
The veteran explained to Walz’s aide that “there’s a huge difference between being deployed to a base in Italy and being in a combat zone in Afghanistan.”
I’ve lost track of the mess that has become presumptive Democratic VP candidate Gov. Tim Walz’s military record.
Well, another shoe dropped.
Chuck Ross at The Washington Beacon discovered that Walz’s Congressional office never corrected his claims that he served in combat during Operation Enduring Freedom, the name of the war in Afghanistan.
Walz described himself as an Operation Enduring Freedom veteran in 2006 when he first ran for Congress.
We also learned from Jordan Schachtel that a 2006 profile of Walz in The Atlantic described him as someone who served in that war overseas.
In 2004, Walz organized a protest against then-President George Bush. He carried a sign that said “Enduring Freedom Veterans for Kerry.”
That title is only awarded to those who “served on the ground in Afghanistan during the Global War on Terrorism.”
Iraq war veteran David Thul decided to confront Walz over his claims, filming his encounter at Walz’s Mankato office in 2009:
Thul filmed the encounter, in which a staffer told Thul she was “not aware” of Walz serving in Afghanistan. Thul went on to present the 2004 photo of Walz, as well as Walz’s website, to another aide, who acknowledged that constituents could get the false impression that Walz served in Afghanistan.
“Operation Enduring Freedom is limited to Afghanistan and the airspace directly above,” Thul told the aide. “Congressman Walz is clearly claiming … to be an Enduring Freedom veteran. Nobody disputes the fact that he is not an Afghanistan or Enduring Freedom veteran. So this represents a fairly serious issue.” Asked whether he understood how constituents could falsely “assume that means [Walz] served in Afghanistan,” the aide responded, “Perhaps, I guess.”
The aide did not dispute that Walz was pictured in the 2004 photograph, and, indeed, a 2006 Atlantic article describes the spectacle of the future governor protesting the Bush visit with a group of high school students. The aide told Thul he would follow up with him. A source familiar with the situation said neither Walz nor his staffers followed through with that pledge.
Thul explained to the aide that “there’s a huge difference between being deployed to a base in Italy and being in a combat zone in Afghanistan.”
In 2018, Walz told Minnesota Public Radio he never saw combat.
In fact, he “spent time in Norway in support of NATO forces and in Italy working in support of Operation Enduring Freedom.”
The criticism has followed Walz since those days.
Walz’s battalion spoke out against him in 2018.
Tom Behrends gave an in-depth interview in 2022.
Behrends came out again yesterday to The New York Post.
A few even tweeted their disgust towards Walz.
Here I am on our Iraq deployment with the Minnesota Army National Guard, the very same deployment @Tim_Walz bailed on. https://t.co/FNEhq3FHFM pic.twitter.com/unfNptN2Oi
— J.R. Salzman (@jrsalzman) August 7, 2024
I served in the Minnesota National Guard with him. He literally abandoned us when we were about to be deployed to Iraq. He's a coward and should be treated as such. https://t.co/NPMfyUCjf2
— J.R. Salzman (@jrsalzman) August 7, 2024
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Must be something in the water of these Minnesota politicians.
“Sen. Tina Smith, D-Minn., who is working to help Vice President Kamala Harris defeat the GOP ticket, appeared on CNN and responded to Sen. JD Vance’s recent claim that Harris’ running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, is misleading the country about his veteran status. Vance famously enlisted in the Marines and served in Iraq long before entering politics, but that was news to Smith.
“Here is Tim Walz who enlisted when he was 17 years old, he served in the National Guard for 24 years. And I’m not aware of any military service that JD Vance has ever served, so let’s just make the comparison there,” Smith told CNN viewers.”
https://www.foxnews.com/media/cnns-jim-acosta-forced-correct-harris-surrogate-suggesting-jd-vance-never-served-military
A US SENATOR, no less.
And Klobachar resembles Harris when it comes to human resources expertise.
You’re surprised?
These people have taken an oath to support the US Constitution (Article VI), yet have NO awareness that the purpose of our constitution is to LIMIT the federal beast.
Not surprised. Better to see it as disgusted.
I was even more shocked that Acosta didn’t let her get away with that statement
Surprisingly, I dislike this guy even more than I loathe Harris. He’s a real piece of work, the prototypical REMF.
Should we be proud that he has continued the western traditions of the Palatine Guard?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scholae_Palatinae
“Under Emperor Zeno (r. 474–491), they degenerated to parade-ground display troops: as it became possible to buy an appointment into the ranks of the scholae, and the social status and benefits this entailed, the units were increasingly filled with by the capital’s well-connected young nobility. Emperor Justinian is said to have caused panic amongst their members by proposing that they be sent on an expedition. Justinian also raised four “supernumerary” scholae of 2,000 men purely in order to raise money from the sale of the appointments. It seems that this increase was reverted by the same emperor later”
Multiple Roman Emperors helped fill their coffers by selling slots in their guards to the Roman equivalent to Tim Walz.
Eventually, the actual job of guarding the Byzantine Emperor was done by the Varangian Guard, essentially mercenary Vikings.
Telling that the Emperor would end up trusting “barbarian” foreigners with his personal security more than his own people.
Wouldn’t you trust them more than the Roman equivalent of Tim Walz to?
This also has to do with surrounding oneself with people who won’t hesitate to kill citizens. The USSR made a point of making it’s ground units demographically homogeneous. So, for instance, they’d raise a brigade of Georgians. They would then take those Georgians and station them near a city filled with another demographic with whom the Georgians had some sort of beef. The message to the city was clear – Act up, and we’ll turn the Georgians on you.
Who will replace Walz at this late hour? Who will then ascend to replace a faltering Harris. We shall see.
Deal, Obama never corrected his birth certificate.