A veteran who served alongside Kamala Harris’s running mate, Gov. Tim Walz, has accused him of exaggerating his military service and deserting his unit right before their deployment.
Retired Command Sgt. Maj. Thomas Behrends, who claims he was part of Walz’s battalion, criticized the Minnesota governor on “The Ingraham Angle” for misleading the public about his military career. Walz’s service ended when he retired from the Minnesota National Guard just before his unit was deployed to Iraq in 2005. According to the New York Post, Walz filed his retirement papers five to seven months before the deployment orders were given in July of that year.
When asked about Sen. JD Vance’s accusation of “stolen valor,” Behrends told Laura Ingraham that Walz’s actions were “far darker than a lot of people think.” He accused Walz of using a rank he never achieved to further his political career, noting that Walz still claims to be a retired command sergeant major, which he is not. “He’s used the rank of others to make it look like he’s a better person than he is,” Behrends said.
Walz’s military record came under scrutiny after Vice President Kamala Harris announced him as her running mate for the 2024 Democratic ticket. Despite Walz’s biography on his governor’s website describing him as a retired “command sergeant major,” the Minnesota National Guard confirmed to Fox News that he retired as a master sergeant. Walz has also claimed he carried a gun “in war,” though he never saw active combat.
Ingraham pointed out that to most people, carrying a weapon “in war” implies active combat, earning combat pay, and being in a dangerous environment. Behrends mocked Walz’s perception of his service, saying, “If he thinks Italy was a combat zone or a war zone, and he was carrying that in war, he’s delusional.”
According to Behrends, Walz was promoted to command sergeant major in 2004 but needed to serve an additional two years to keep the promotion. His early retirement invalidated the promotion, reducing his rank back to master sergeant. “What he did, basically, was he quit. He didn’t complete that condition of doing two years after graduation, so he gets reduced to a master sergeant, and that’s what he is right now, is a retired master sergeant,” Behrends concluded.
The controversy surrounding Walz’s military service raises questions about his integrity and the honesty of his political persona, casting a shadow over his candidacy as he joins Harris on the Democratic ticket.
