Since his announcement on Tuesday, one of the lines of attack against Tim Walz is that he has misrepresented his military record to the point of committing “Stolen Valor.” Today, OTB commenter @Lucysfootball asked about the topic in the Daily Open Comments thread:
So this is the Walz quote that the right is attacking hoim with:
“I spent 25 years in the Army and I hunt. I’ve been voting for common sense legislation that protects the Second Amendment, but we can do background checks. We can research the impacts of gun violence. We can make sure those weapons of war, that I carried in war, are only carried in war,” Walz said in his speech, aiming toward voters who don’t want guns on the streets.
There are lots of military vets here, I’m wondering what they think of this quote?
Before I go any further, let me be clear: I have not served in the military and cannot comment on this from a military perspective. I have spent time over the last few days looking into this to try and disentangle what facts exist and then offer my perspective on how they are being interpreted.
Going back to @Lucysfootball’s comment, there are three primary attacks and two minor ones that have emerged to date. I am placing these in a rough order from the biggest claims to the smallest ones:
- Walz retired to avoid deployment to Iraq and, in doing so, abandoned his unit.
- Walz has misrepresented his rank, claiming to be a rank higher (Command Sergeant Major – E9) than his retirement rank (Master Sergeant – E8).
- Walz claimed to have been in combat (tied to @Lucyfootball’s quote).
- Walz never deployed during the Global War on Terror.
- Walz steals valor by wearing a special forces hat.
Here’s what the facts say (with some commentary from a range of people who have military experience). First, let’s get rid of the two minor ones:
Walz steals valor by wearing a special forces hat.
This is the most out-there one and pretty easily dismissed. The hat was gifted to him by a Special Forces unit when Walz was on the Congressional Armed Services committee. Here’s context from the Stolen Valor Xtter account (which is one of the sources for this article).
This argument is similar to saying that wearing a Yankee’s hat gifted to you by the team is the same as claiming you played for the Yankees.
Walz never deployed during the Global War on Terror.
This is easily proven false. During his final tour of duty with the Minnesota National Guard, Walz deployed to Europe in 2003 as part of the Global War on Terror (aka Operation Enduring Freedom). From the Washington Post:
Walz, asked by the oral history interviewer where his combat experience occurred, said initially that his unit — the 1st Battalion, 125th Field Artillery — had served “throughout the European theater with Operation Enduring Freedom,” the name the Pentagon used to describe the war in Afghanistan and other counterterrorism assignments. A Minnesota Army National Guard history of Walz’s battalion verifies that the unit deployed in 2003 to Italy, Turkey, Belgium and Britain in support of the war effort.
Walz clarified later in the interview that he and his fellow Guard members initially thought they would fire artillery, but later learned they would be assigned in Europe to backfill other U.S. troops who were going to war.
Now that the easily disproven claims are out of the way, we get into the thornier questions.
Walz claimed to have been in combat.
At no point in his career has Walz explicitly claimed to have been in combat or served in a combat zone. As I just noted, his one OEF deployment was to Europe. While it was in support of the Afghan war, he and his unit, never got closer to Afghanistan than Turkey.
However, he did make statements like the one @Lucysfootball noted which, intentionally or not, implied combat:
Walz: “We can make sure those weapons of war, that I carried in war, are only carried in war.”
The phrase people have called attention to is “that I carried in war.” Walz did carry a standard-issue rifle at times during his service and he served during a war. He most likely didn’t carry it often during his time in Europe. From the Washington Post:
Thomas Behrends, a retired command sergeant major who also was on that deployment, said it was very clear that their unit was not going to war.
“He’s sugarcoating it to make it more than it was,” Behrends said. After 9/11, he added, the Air Force realized it needed to better safeguard its airfields and requested the National Guard to assist.
“That was the mission from the get-go,” Behrends said. “There was nothing ever said about going to combat.”
For context, Retired Command Sergeant Major Thomas Behrends is one of the two primary critics of Walz’s service. However, I think he has a point on this one. When the average person hears “in a war” they often interpret it as “in combat.” Military members clearly see it in similar terms, as our own @Steve, who is a military veteran, responded to @Lucysfootball today with:
I served during the Vietnam war but did not deploy there so I learned long ago not to declare myself a Vietnam vet.
In using those words Walz hammered home his view that AR-platform rifles are weapons of war. It would have been more accurate to say, “We can make sure those weapons of war, that I carried in the National Guard, are only carried in war.” Rhetorically it doesn’t work as well. But that doesn’t excuse the ambiguity created by what he said.
Walz retired to avoid deployment to Iraq and, in doing so, abandoned his unit.
This claim isn’t so much one of Stolen Valor as it is, I guess, cowardess. At least that is the way that J. D. Vance has framed it:
“When the United State Marine Corps, when the United States of America asked me to go to Iraq to serve my country, I did it. I did what they asked me to do, and I did it honorably and I’m very proud of that service. When Tim Walz was asked by his country to go to Iraq, you know what he did? He dropped out of the Army and allowed his unit to go without him,”
[source: https://www.cnn.com/2024/08/07/politics/tim-walz-military-record-vance-attack/index.html]
Ultimately, this is the muddiest of all the claims due to timelines and a question of who did what, who knew what, and when did everything happen. Thankfully Task and Purpose has done great research into the timeline, so I don’t have to pull everything together:
- April 2004: Walz returns to Minnesota with the 1/125th after a year-long deployment as part of Operation Enduring Freedom in Turkey and Europe. Walz was stationed at Vicenza, Italy, where the unit pulled guard duty on friendly military bases, which may have been back-fill duty for active duty units deployed to Afghanistan. He was promoted to command sergeant major of the battalion soon after returning.
- March 2005: Walz’s newly-formed campaign for a Congressional House seat releases a press release that indicates Walz is aware of a possible but unconfirmed deployment, though no official orders have been announced. “The National Guard Public Affairs Office announced a possible partial mobilization of roughly 2,000 troops from the Minnesota National Guard,” the press release said. “The announcement from the National Guard PAO specified that all or a portion of Walz’s battalion could be mobilized to serve in Iraq within the next two years… When asked about his possible deployment to Iraq Walz said, ‘As Command Sergeant Major I have a responsibility not only to ready my battalion for Iraq, but also to serve if called on. I am dedicated to serving my country to the best of my ability, whether that is in Washington DC or in Iraq.”
- May 2005: Walz officially retires from the Minnesota National Guard after 24 years of service, according to documents posted online that appear to be his NGB Form 22, a Report of Separation and Record of Service. Walz previously retired after 20 years of service but returned to service after Sept. 11, he wrote in a Winona Daily News opinion piece, re-enlisting for four years. However, his NGB Form 22 indicates his “terminal reserve/military service obligation” date was September 2007.
One important thing to note here is that, like most jobs, you don’t just announce on the day you are leaving that you are retiring. While I couldn’t find a document that gave guidance for when to submit the request for retirement, I found the recommendations for Air Reservists and these mirror what I have seen people say about the National Guard (and most military branches):
Retirees can apply no earlier than 12 months prior to their retirement effective date. It is recommended that applications are submitted no later than 180 days prior (earlier the better) to their retirement effective date to ensure payment and/or benefits are received on time.
Assuming Walz followed a similar recommended timeframe, he would have submitted his retirement papers sometime in September 2004 (180 days before his retirement date). Theoretically, Walz could have known about the possible deployment as early as then, but there’s no evidence to back that up. Here’s Task and Purpose on that part of the timeline:
- July 2005: The 125th Field Artillery Regiment receives initial call-up orders and, that fall, deploys for training in Mississippi as part of the 34th Infantry Divisions’ 1st Brigade Combat Team.
- March 2006: The 125th deploys to Iraq, 10 months after Walz had separated from the unit. The unit will not return until September 2007.
Many details of Walz’s decision process remain unclear. The press release by Walz’s campaign indicates he knew a deployment was possible at least four months before the unit received official orders and two before he retired. But that timeline could have several missing pieces.
For one, such advanced ‘heads-up’ notice is commonly provided to senior leaders of deployable units, and can often change or fall through as Pentagon planners shuffle deployment plans a year or more ahead of time.
A second uncertainty lies in the May 2005 retirement date when Walz’s retirement became official. It likely came many months after he ‘dropped his papers’ to inform his chain of command he intended to retire, beginning the process.
So here’s the tl;dr: Walz had retired from the guard at the 20-year mark and then re-enlisted after 9/11. He served four years in the guard and was eligible for retirement. By that time, he was 40, married, and had a young child at home. He had already been deployed once in the Global War on Terror. He had also made the decision that he was going to run for Congress and was in the process of laying the groundwork for that. And, he most likely had filed to retire in the fall of 2004. Also if he had chosen to stay in until the unit was deployed, he would have had to wait until 2006 and would not have been able to run for Congress.
As Task and Purpose notes, even some Walz critics have said he was well within his rights to make this decision:
At least one soldier who knew Walz as well as any has defended him — despite not being a fan. Joseph Eustice, whose personal Facebook page today has anti-Walz posts, held the same job as Walz — command sergeant major of 1st battalion, 125th Artillery Regiment.
When the retirement controversy flared up in 2022, Eustice told local media that Walz fulfilled his duty.
“He was a great soldier,” Eustice told the Star Tribune. “When he chose to leave, he had every right to leave.”
Several other soldiers from Walz’s unit echoed that sentiment, including a former brigadier general.
Walz has misrepresented his rank, claiming to be a rank higher (Command Sergeant Major – E9) than his retirement rank (Master Sergeant – E8)
This is another case where the facts are clear, but the way Walz’s office has represented them isn’t very transparent. Starting with the facts from Military.com:
Walz enlisted in the Army National Guard in Nebraska in 1981 and retired honorably in 2005 as the top enlisted soldier for 1st Battalion, 125th Field Artillery Regiment, in the Minnesota National Guard, according to a copy of his records provided by the Minnesota Guard. He reached the rank of command sergeant major and served in that role, but he officially retired as a master sergeant for benefits purposes because he didn’t finish a required training course, according to the records and a statement from the Minnesota Guard.
Now we get to the representation issue. If we look at Walz’s biography on the Minnesota government site, it contains this passage:
After 24 years in the Army National Guard, Command Sergeant Major Walz retired from the 1-125th Field Artillery Battalion in 2005.
Likewise, his congressional bio states:
Walz enlisted in the Army National Guard at the young age of 17, and retired 24 years later as
Command Sergeant Major.
Now we get into a topic I didn’t know anything about before two days ago (which, according to Xtter is just enough time to become a newly minted expert): Military Retirement Ranks. When you retire from the military, your retirement rank is used to determine benefits. At the time he retired, he had the provisional rank of Command Sergeant Major (an E9 position) and was serving in that role. However, he did not complete the coursework or the necessary service timeframe to be permanently given the rank, so his retirement rank is one lower, Sergeant Major (E8).
As with the “I carried in war” comment above, I think both bio entries are playing loose with the truth. What they said is technically true, we has serving in that capacity at the time of retirement, but don’t tell the full story. Simply put, I think there is weasel wording happening here.
[Update: In a true example of “bothsiderism” one of the Trump supporters who has attacked Walz is engaged in the same sort of weasel wording about their rank. In 2022, Ronny Jackson was investigated by the Navy for a number of issues and had his retirement rank reduced from Rear Admiral to Captain. His current Congressional website uses language very similar to Walz’s when talking about his rank:
In December 2019, after 25 years of distinguished service to his country, Dr. Jackson retired from the United States Navy as a Rear Admiral.
On Jackson’s Veteran’s issue page he also repeats the claim:
As a retired U.S. Navy Rear Admiral with nearly three decades of military service I understand the commitment and sacrifices made by servicemen and servicewomen to serve our country. I am very in tune with their needs, and that of their families.
From the Texas Tribune’s reporting on Jackson:
But Jackson is no longer a retired admiral. The Navy demoted him in July 2022 following a damaging Pentagon inspector general’s report that substantiated allegations about his inappropriate behavior as a White House physician, a previously unreported decision confirmed by a current defense official and a former U.S. official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive personnel move.
Jackson is now a retired Navy captain, those people said — a demotion that carries significant financial burden in addition to the social stigma of stripped rank in military circles.
Despite the demotion, Jackson has continued to refer to himself as a retired rear admiral, including in statements released since the Navy reclassified him as a retired captain. Former president Donald Trump and other Republicans have also continued to publicly describe Jackson using his former rank; it’s unclear if they were aware of his demotion.
One would hope that the Trump campaign would be as concerned with this weasel wording and getting retirement rank correct as they are with Walz.]
But is it Stolen Valor?
From a lay persons perspective, while Walz is using weasel words, I don’t think it rises to my understanding of Stolen Valor (and definitely not to the level of the 2013 amended Stolen Valor act).
FWIW, this is reflected in the views of one Veteran with political experience who recently expressed his views on the topic. Former Republican Congressman Peter Meijer wrote the following take:
Gonna piss off everyone with this take, but what the hell:
I think Walz played fast & loose with his military bio to stay above water as his congressional district drifted right. He let audiences paint in their minds a deceptive picture. It was shady but not stolen valor. (1/5)Walz alluding to “weapons in war, that I carried in war” to give credibility to his pro gun control stance intentionally sought to paint this ‘deceptive picture,’ just like saying ‘deployed during OEF.’ But he didn’t claim unearned medals or lie about being in IRQ/AFG. (2/5)
Some earlier reporting bought the ‘deceptive picture’ I mentioned above, but that’s not Walz’ words. I’ve had reporters say/write that I was a Marine, or an Afghanistan vet. Trickier was ‘combat vet,’ which I didn’t claim but others have described. His burden to correct. (3/5)
I’d try to correct reporting on me- I definitely wasn’t a Marine, and though I spent 18 mos in AFG vs 9 mos in Iraq, fact is I was a civilian in AFG + not in uniform (tho in much more danger). Veteran of that conflict in a sense, but not in the sense ‘Afghan vet’ connotes. (4/5)
Whether the mobilization/retirement timing was coincidental or a dick move is something I think only the enlisted soldiers in his unit can say. I know one or two have spoken publicly it was a dick move, but I’d like to hear from a plurality to account for personal beefs. (5/5)
Unrelated to Walz, the ‘combat vet’ identifier has always made me wince. I wouldn’t correct if someone called me one but I’m not comfortable describing myself as a ‘combat vet.’ I served in a combat zone, regularly left the wire, was on a number of smaller bases, and took occasional on-base IDF (including at least one POI probably within a CAB-qualifying <100m). But to me, ‘combat vet’ implies firing a shot in anger, getting fired at, or frequently being in a position to potentially have one or the other happen.
If I described myself as a ‘combat vet’ it would create an inaccurate picture of my service- and even if I met a technical definition and the underlying facts are accurate, that’s still deceptive in my book.
Meijer would go on to add:
More information may come out that changes my view, but for the moment I’m aligned with Meijer. I don’t think this is a good look for Walz AND I also think this is being blown out of proportion for political reasons. That is, as I mentioned yesterday, normal politics. But I wonder if this is a great long-term play, especially when the Republican running for President was a draft dodger.
