The presidential campaign of Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz says that Walz “misspoke” when incorrectly claiming that he carried a gun “in war” while serving in the military.
A 2018 video that the Harris-Walz campaign shared on social media earlier this week shows the governor, who served 24 years in the Army National Guard, calling for tighter laws on assault weapons while arguing that “those weapons of war, that I carried in war,” should “only [be] carried in war.”
Republican Senator JD Vance, a Marine Corps veteran and the running mate of former President Donald Trump, has accused Walz of “stolen valor” over the weapons remarks and for having allegedly “abandoned” his battalion by retiring and launching his political career before the unit deployed to Iraq.
“Governor Walz would never insult or undermine any American’s service to this country—in fact, he thanks Senator Vance for putting his life on the line for our country. It’s the American way,” Harris-Walz campaign spokesperson Ammar Moussa told The Washington Post on Friday.
“In making the case for why weapons of war should never be on our streets or in our classrooms, the governor misspoke,” Moussa added. “He did handle weapons of war and believes strongly that only military members trained to carry those deadly weapons should have access to them, unlike Donald Trump and JD Vance who prioritize the gun lobby over our children.”
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Walz never spent any of his military career in combat, although he did spend nine months in Italy in support of U.S. forces during Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan. Vance, who spent four years in the Marines, was deployed as a press officer in Iraq for six months but also never saw combat.
Other popular Republican criticisms of Walz’s service record include accusations that he misrepresented his rank by saying that he retired as a command sergeant major. Walz did become a command sergeant major before retiring but his rank later reverted to sergeant major because he did not complete coursework required to maintain the command distinction.
Retired Command Sergeant Major Doug Julin, who served as a commander to Walz, has accused the governor of doing “something wrong in service” and letting “his troops down” by going over Julin’s head to secure retirement after decades of service in May 2005, months before the battalion was given a mobilization order to deploy to Iraq.
While some of Walz’s fellow former soldiers have been critical of his military record, others have defended the governor’s service. When contacted by Newsweek, the Harris-Walz campaign pointed to several remarks from soldiers who served with Walz, including from retired Command Sergeant Major Joseph Eustice, who led the future governor’s battalion.
“The accusation about him skirting his duty, or running out on his battalion, I don’t find that to be credible,” Eustice told CNN‘s Brianna Keilar on Friday. “All we knew at the time was there was a rumor we were going to deploy … When the Iraq War came up, a rumor started that every battalion was going to deploy … But you don’t deploy on rumors.”
“I don’t see eye-to-eye on any of his politics,” he added. “[But] saying that he is a traitor or shirked his duty, in my opinion, is an unfair assessment of what took place … I don’t think it’s fair to take the 24 years that he served and try to decide that he didn’t serve honorably or that he did something that he shouldn’t have done.”
Retired Staff Sergeant Ryan Marti, who deployed with the unit to Italy with Walz and to Iraq without him, said during a CNN interview on Thursday night that the governor “is probably one of the most honorable men I know” and that he has “no hurt feelings” about his retirement from the military.