Vice President Kamala Harris proudly announced Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate this week.
The Harris campaign in particular touted Walz’s blue-collar background and his military experience — hoping that it would appeal to voters.
So why is the Harris team suddenly erasing information about Walz she doesn’t want the public to know about?
According to a Fox News report, the Harris campaign altered its biography of Walz on its campaign website, making a change to a reference to his military service amid ongoing scrutiny of Walz’s military credentials.
Walz’s biography initially said he was a “retired Command Sergeant Major.”
It now says that he “served as a command sergeant major.”
Since he was selected as Harris’ running mate, reports have questioned the exact nature his background as Minnesota’s governor, a lawmaker and a member of the National Guard.
When Walz left the Guard, he had achieved the rank of command sergeant major, but he was reduced in rank months after retiring, leaving him as a master sergeant. National Guard officials have said that he retired before fulfilling requirements for the position, including coursework at the U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy. The subsequent lower rank was due to benefit requirements and a technicality.
However, Republicans have accused Walz of engaging in “stolen valor garbage.”
“Do not pretend to be something that you’re not,” Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, and former President Trump’s running mate, said this week. Vance is a Marine Corps veteran.
“I’d be ashamed if I was saying that I lied about my military service like you did,” he said.
Vance accused Walz of having dropped out of the National Guard to avoid serving in the Iraq War.
“As a Marine who served his country in uniform when the United States 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,” he said. “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, a fact that he’s been criticized for aggressively by a lot of the people that he served with.”
Army Lt. Col. Ryan Rossman, the Minnesota National Guard’s director of operations, explained Walz’s rank at the time of his retirement in a statement to Fox News.
“He was technically a command sergeant major when he deployed to Europe with his battalion but to retire as a CSM you have to go through a final course, which he had not completed. So, from a benefits perspective, the Army retired him as a master sergeant (lower enlisted rank). But, according to National Guard records, he was a command sergeant major technically when deployed. The lower rank was as a result of benefit requirements and a technicality.”
The Harris campaign continues to defend Walz’s military service.
“After 24 years of military service, Governor Walz retired in 2005 and ran for Congress, where he chaired Veterans Affairs and was a tireless advocate for our men and women in uniform. And as vice president of the United States, he will continue to be a relentless champion for our veterans and military families,” the campaign said this week.