Tim Walz’s Former Squadmate: If He’d Gone to Iraq, He’d Have Been ‘Hiding Under a Desk’
Anyone who claims to understand the forces at work in modern U.S. politics has almost certainly exaggerated.
For instance, on July 13, former President Donald Trump responded to a failed assassination attempt with a display of defiant courage. Afterward, only the most deranged Trump haters could deny that they had witnessed what all human beings from the beginning of time have recognized as rare bravery.
Then, little more than three weeks later, Vice President and 2024 Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris chose as her running mate a man who, according to a former command sergeant major and fellow NCO in the Minnesota Army National Guard, would “still be hiding under his desk” had he not skipped out on deployment to Iraq nearly two decades ago.
According to Retired Command Sgt. Maj. Tom Behrends, who served a two-year deployment to Iraq, Democratic Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, whom Harris selected as her running mate on Tuesday, showed “pathetic” leadership and “abandoned” the men in his command — all as a prelude to “stolen valor.”
Behrends made those comments in a 2022 interview with Alpha News, posted to YouTube.
In sum, the Iraq veteran’s charges against Walz — if true — involve both cowardice and dishonesty.
Do American voters care about those things, or do they care about celebrity endorsements? Time alone might reveal that answer.
In the meantime, Behrends’ interview painted a picture of an opportunist who shrank from duty.
“As soon as the shots were fired in Iraq, he turned and ran the other way and hung his hat up and quit,” Behrends said of Walz.
To be clear, the current Minnesota governor never actually made it to Iraq.