Wednesday morning, Senator JD Vance was giving public remarks on the campaign trail when he mentioned his opponent Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, and his "controversial" military service record. Vance then laid into Walz, essentially calling him a coward, and rightly so, when he mentioned Walz's decision to abandon his troops right before they deployed to Iraq in 2004. 

.@JDVance: "You know what really bothers me about Tim Walz, as a Marine who served his country in uniform? When the United States of America asked me to go to Iraq to serve my country, I did it...When Tim Walz was asked by his country to go to Iraq...he dropped out of the Army." pic.twitter.com/h8Wce3QNAi

— MAGA War Room (@MAGAIncWarRoom) August 7, 2024

To be perfectly clear, I 100 percent agree with Vance in his remarks, though because I am not running for Vice President of the United States, I would be much more colorful in my language describing Walz and his shameful behavior. Walz is absolutely a coward and a liar, and he uses and embellishes his service record for political gain. 

RedState helped break the story regarding Walz's military service when several of his former peers in the Minnesota National Guard called him out for cowardice and lying. The biggest complaints are how Walz continues to lie by omission when he says he was the most senior enlisted soldier when he was in Congress as a Command Sergeant Major — he was reduced in rank to Master Sergeant — and that he knowingly abandoned his unit before they deployed to Iraq in 2004. 

In an undated video posted to X, Walz is seen and heard ranting about gun control. Being a Democrat, that itself is not shocking or unusual. However, where he slipped up was when he called for banning so-called assault weapons. Walz said he wanted to ensure that "weapons of war like I carried when I went to war" stay on the battlefield. Again, the problem is he has no idea what a battlefield looks like and never carried a weapon in war, because he never went to war. 

Here Walz is stumping for banning your guns and at the end of his rant, he claims he carried "weapons of war" "in war". Everything I can find about him says he didn't serve in combat and it's being reported when war came, he dodged deployment. pic.twitter.com/79TlC7aloB

— Military Arms (@MAC_Arms) August 7, 2024

Serving in the United States military has been voluntary since 1973, when the all-volunteer force (AVF) went into effect after President Richard Nixon signed the legislation in 1971. Since then, Americans and residents alike could volunteer to serve in the military's active, reserve, or National Guard components. People serve for a plethora of reasons, but they all serve with the understanding that they may be called one day to serve in combat. Pre-9/11, the use of military force was rare, or at least much rarer than it is today. Serving in the military was almost viewed as "safe," as some of my senior Marines who had served for several years before 9/11 had said to me. 

When I enlisted in 1999, in my junior year of high school, war was the last thing on my mind. I thought I was just going to join the Marine Corps and spend four years doing some pretty cool training. That, my friends, is one of the best examples of naivete because reality hit not even two months into BootCamp, when our Drill Instructors came out and said we were going to war when we saw the USS Cole with a gaping hole in her side after a suicide bomber blew her up, killing 17 Sailors and wounding 37 others. Nothing ever happened with that, but war and combat became a real thing to think about; then, the terrorist attacks on September 11th changed everything for us. War would come, not if, but when.

For those who went into their recruiter's offices on September 12th, 2001, they all went in there knowing that there was a distinct possibility they would be going to war. Especially those who chose the combat arms path, like infantry for me, or say, artillery, like Walz. I should note, that between 2001 and 2012 and possibly years past that, 0.45 percent of the American population served in the military. In a powerful and emotional essay penned by former Army Ranger and Captain Nick Palmisciano titled "The 0.45%," he wrote of the powerful statistic of the number of those who served and the burden they had to bear. I strongly encourage everyone to read the essay in its entirety. 

In World War II, 11.2% of the nation served in four years. In Vietnam, 4.3% served in 12 years. Since 2001, only 0.45% of our population has served in the Global War on Terror. These are unbelievable statistics.

Over time, fewer and fewer people have shouldered more and more of the burden and it is only getting worse. Our troops were sent to war in Iraq by a Congress consisting of 10% veterans with only one person having a child in the military. Taxes did not increase to pay for the war. War bonds were not sold. Gas was not regulated. In fact, the average citizen was asked to sacrifice nothing, and has sacrificed nothing unless they have chosen to out of the goodness of their hearts.

The only people who have sacrificed are the veterans and their families. The volunteers. The people who swore an oath to defend this nation. You.

You stand there, deployment after deployment and fight on. You’ve lost relationships, spent years of your lives in extreme conditions, years apart from kids you’ll never get back, and beaten your body in a way that even professional athletes don’t understand. And you come home to a nation that doesn’t understand.

They don’t understand suffering. They don’t understand sacrifice. They don’t understand that bad people exist. They look at you like you’re a machine – like something is wrong with you.

Governor Walz was technically one of those people who signed up after 9/11 when he re-enlisted just seven days after 9/11 for six years. He signed up for another six years, not four as he falsely claimed.

According to his official Report of Separation and Record of Service, he re-enlisted for six years on September 18th, 2001. However, in his response he says that he re-enlisted for four years, conveniently retiring a year before his battalion was deployed to Iraq. Even if he had re-enlisted for four years following Sept.11, his retirement date would have been September 18th, 2005. Why then did he "retire" on May 16th, 2005, before his supposed four-year enlistment was up? And he makes it sound like he "retired" a year before his battalion deployed to Iraq; when in reality he knew when he "retired" that the battalion would be deployed to Iraq.

Tim Walz is an American coward, plain and simple. He betrayed his word, his contract; he betrayed his men. He committed the ultimate act of betrayal, and that is irrefutable. It is beyond offensive to those of us who not only served our country but who had the honor and privilege to serve with our brothers and sisters in combat. 

War is absolutely hell, literally and figuratively speaking. It is filled with death, destruction, despair, stress, and much more, but I have to say, I loved it too. I loved combat. It was the ultimate test of strength and ability, to fight another armed foe on the battlefield; it was the ultimate rush. Yes, I am scarred for the rest of my life because of it, but no warrior comes out of a scrap without scars. To be clear, I do not see myself as anything special or someone who needs or wants validation or admiration for what I chose to do, but I do deserve a little respect for living up to my word as a man when I said I would go. I have photos to back that up, too, whereas Walz only has figments of his imagination. 

I was not supposed to go back to Iraq when I did in 2004. I had completed my four-year contractual obligation to the Marines and could have gotten out in August of 2004. Instead, to the chagrin of my family and friends, I volunteered for another tour and extended my contract for another year. I could not stomach the fact that I would be abandoning my brothers when they were to go back. Myself and two others all extended to go back with our boys.

In contrast, Walz most likely said to himself, "Screw this, I won't go." He knew his unit was going to Iraq for months and told all his peers and leaders that he was going to go — that they could count on him. But at the last minute, like a true coward, he abruptly quit (you can do that in the National Guard). He couldn't even be bothered to show up and sign his discharge paperwork. His military family was about to get into a scrap, and he just said to them he was just gonna go sit this one out. Pathetic.

Walz is not a leader; he is a sheep in a sea of sheep, trying to convince them that he is a sheepdog when he is the farthest from it. JD Vance did not serve in a combat MOS; he was a combat camera, and he has openly said he never saw combat when he was in Iraq. But Vance honored his commitment to the Corps and the country and did not shy away from deploying in any way. Yes, I understand that as a junior enlisted non-commissioned officer, he did not have the capability of telling his leaders "no," and that he had to follow orders. But Vance willingly obeyed his orders and lived up to what it means to be a man by doing what you say and saying what you do. Walz did not, and for that, he is no real man in the figurative sense of the word. He is a coward and a fraud, a person who takes the easy way out and lies about it. I refuse to pay any iota of respect to a person who so readily says, "Screw it, I quit," and walks away on their family.