Sen. J.D. Vance, a Republican from Ohio, blamed the Minnesota governor. Tim Waltz on Wednesday for leaving the U.S. Army National Guard two decades ago to avoid being sent to Iraq and for exaggerating his service record to falsely claim he saw combat.
The two incendiary charges represent the most strident attacks by Republicans on the Minnesota governor and appear aimed at undermining the Democratic ticket's string of positive news coverage since Vice President Kamala Harris succeeded President Joe Biden as a party candidate.
The allegations by Vance, who served four years in the Marine Corps, against Walz, whose National Guard career spanned 24 years, also served to contrast the military records of the two major-party vice presidential candidates.
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Speaking Wednesday morning at the Shelby, Michigan, police department, Vance said Walz effectively deserted the National Guard to avoid serving in Iraq, as he left the National Guard in May 2005, months before his artillery unit was ordered to deploy there.
“You left your unit right before they went to Iraq,” Vance said.
Vance based his allegations on a 2018 Facebook post and a paid letter to the editor of the West Central Tribune that year in which authors Thomas Behrends and Paul Herr, both retired Minnesota National Guard sergeants majors, accused Walz of “conveniently retiring a year before his battalion was deployed to Iraq.”
The criticism first came from Behrends and Herr during Walz's first campaign for governor.
But Joseph Eustis, a 32-year-old National Guard veteran who commanded the same battalion as Walz and served under him, said in an interview Wednesday that the governor was a reliable soldier and that his comrades' attacks were unfounded.
“He was the finest soldier you could ever imagine, and for two former petty officers to say he wasn't is simply not true,” Eustis said, adding that he disagrees with Walz's political views and likely won't vote for him in November, even though they are friends.
Eustis recalled that Walz's decision to run for Congress came months before the battalion received formal notification of deployment, although he said there were rumors it might deploy.
The two men were training in early 2005 when Walz, then a sergeant major, turned to Eustis, then a first sergeant, and said, “I have to ask you something. I'm thinking of running for Congress,” Eustis recalled.
“I said, 'What the hell is wrong?'” he added. “I mean, why would you want to do something like that?”
The Harris-Waltz campaign did not provide any new details about the timing of Waltz's decision to retire. Instead, it pointed to other past comments from fellow Guardsmen who said Waltz had been thinking about running for office for some time and that the decision to leave the military weighed heavily on him.
“After 24 years of military service, Governor Walz retired in 2005 and ran for Congress, where he chaired the Veterans Affairs Committee and was a tireless advocate for our men and women in uniform,” said Ammar Moussa, a campaign spokesman, “and as Vice President of the United States, he will continue to be a tireless advocate for our veterans and military families.”
On Wednesday, Vance also seized on Walz's remark in a video that the Harris campaign circulated on social media Tuesday. In it, the governor told a crowd of his support for gun control, saying “we can make sure that the guns I carried during war are only used during war.”
However, Walz never saw combat, prompting Vance to accuse him of “stolen valor.”
“I would be ashamed if I were in his shoes and lied about my military service like he did,” Vance said.
Walz was deployed after the September 11 attacks as part of Operation Enduring Freedom, but not in a combat zone.
“The governor has carried, fired, and trained others to use weapons of war countless times,” Moussa said. “Governor Walz would never insult or undermine the service Americans have to this country — in fact, he thanks Senator Vance for putting his life on the line for our country. That is the American way.”
Vance lashed out at Walz over his military background in response to a reporter's question about Walz's suggestion, made in his debut speech with Harris the night before, that Vance was posing as a working-class man.
“Like all the regular people I grew up with in the boonies, J.D. went to Yale, had his career funded by Silicon Valley billionaires, and wrote a best-selling book that trashed that community,” Walz said. “Come on. That’s not what Middle America is.”
But Vance’s comments also echoed the “Swift boat” attacks of 2004, which effectively called into question the wartime exploits of Senator John Kerry, then the Democratic presidential nominee. The key strategist behind those attacks, which helped doom Kerry’s White House victory, was Chris LaCivita, a senior strategist on the Trump campaign.
Walz's long years in uniform began when he enlisted as an infantryman in the Nebraska Army National Guard in 1981, a few days after his 17th birthday. When he transferred to the Minnesota National Guard in the 1990s, his job changed to artillery.
He retired in 2005 as a staff sergeant, but previously served as a master sergeant, one of the highest ranks in the Army.
The indictment also recalled similar criticism former President Donald Trump faced for avoiding military service. The three-time Republican presidential nominee avoided the Vietnam War thanks to a deferment related to bone spurs in his heel, a medical exam done as a favor for Trump’s father, the doctor’s daughter told The New York Times in 2018.
Patrick Murphy, a former U.S. Army captain who was Walz's roommate when they both served in the U.S. House of Representatives, said he was dismayed by the attacks on Walz's military record.
“Anyone who tries to criticize his actions but turns a blind eye to Donald Trump's six Vietnam War deferments is overstepping the mark,” said Murphy, a Pennsylvania Democrat.
Vance served on active duty in the Marine Corps from 2003 to 2007 during the Iraq War.
Vance, then going by the name James D. Hamel, was assigned to the 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing, one of the Marine Corps’ largest subordinate commands, which oversees aircraft such as fighter jets and helicopters. He deployed to Iraq in 2005 and 2006 with the wing, but did not serve as a front-line fighter.
His official military job title, known as a combat correspondent, involved performing basic communications functions such as writing articles about events in his unit.
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