Because Democrat VP candidate Tim Walz and Dem VA-7 US House of Representatives Seat Candidate Yevgeny “Eugene” Vindman both used the exact same lie to misrepresent their Military records, I’m curious if the technique is taught in the Democrat Candidate Playbook or if both using the exact same lies was just a coincidence.
Despite being called out on it for years, MSG Walz continued to claim he was a “Retired Command Sergeant Major” (CSM/E-9) on his website and political campaign literature. Even MSG Walz's bio on the Harris-Walz campaign website described him as a "retired Command Sergeant Major in the Army National Guard” until they were forced to correct it by public ridicule. Although MSG Walz did serve as a CSM/E-9 for about 6 months, he did not qualify to retire in that rank so was demoted to Master Sergeant (MSG/E-8) to go on the retired rolls. The Harris-Walz website correction was artfully worded to be technically correct but to still give the false impression he retired as a CSM. The artful change was to say MSG Walz "served as a Command Sergeant Major."
MSG Walz also lied when he was caught referring to "weapons of war that I carried in war" despite him never having served in a combat zone let alone “in war.” When exposed for this “stolen valor” faux pas and his other lies like being present at the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, MSG Walz explained these “discrepancy” by declaring "I'm a knucklehead at times."
Identical to MSG Walz’s misrepresentations, LTC Vindman served as a Colonel/O6 for five (5) months before being demoted to retire as a Lieutenant Colonel because he did not qualify to retire in the higher grade. That didn’t deter him from falsely referring to himself as: “Colonel Eugene Vindman, US Army Retired” and “Retired Army Colonel Vindman” on his campaign website and other campaign literature as well as in his stump speech. Like the Harris-Walz website correction, LTC Vindman’s was artfully worded to be technically correct but to still give the untruthful impression he is a retired Colonel. He now refers to himself as “a former Army Colonel” but he is still officially on the retired rolls as a Lieutenant Colonel.
Of course LTC Vindman and his surrogates have perpetuated the myth that his promotion was delayed so he was forced to retire by Trump before he had sufficient Time-in-Grade to retire as a Colonel but nothing could be further from the truth. He was considered and promoted to Colonel on time with no disruption to his career and he elected to retire on his own even though it mean being demoted. I suggest anyone that doubts this should read the official DA IG investigation of his treatment.
No one, not even Trump forced LTC Vindman to retire and in fact, he retired in 2022 when Biden was president. LTC Vindman did submit a waiver requesting to be allowed to retire in the grade of COL/06 but it was denied by the Biden administration. This was consistent with normal practice and precedent as there have only been two waivers of officer retiring in a higher grade without serving the required Time-in-Grade in the past 35 years and one was when President Obama allowed GENERAL Stanley McCrystal to retire as a 4 Star General.
Finally, like MSG Walz, LTC Vindman embellished his combat record. His campaign fund raising mailers contained the following statement: “In the Army, I used assault-style weapons on the battlefield. Now, I am running for Congress to ensure these weapons of war are not easier to get than a driver’s license.”
Although LTC Vindman served as an Infantry Officer for almost 10 years, he never had an Infantry command nor went into combat as an Infantryman but after becoming a JAG he did manage to spend 5 months in Iraq as a Captain Law of War advisor in the relatively safe Baghdad Green Zone. During his short stint in Iraq he was never in combat nor fired his weapon despite in his campaign literature he bragged about firing an assault weapon in combat. It should be noted that he received NO combat awards for his shortstay in Iraq and that almost all of his contemporaries had served at least three (3) combat tours/36 months between Iraq and Afghanistan.
To add insult to injury, LTC Vindman is running a campaign ad on TV accusing his VA-7 opponent Army National Guard Special Forces Major Derrick Anderson of lying when he calls him out for originally lying about his retired rank and about falsely claiming to have “used an assault-style weapons on the battlefield” when in fact it’s Vindman that is still lying. For the record, MAJ Anderson has had seven deployments to Southwest Asia including 15 months in Iraq and a tour in Afghanistan and he has been awarded a Bronze Star and the Combat Infantryman Badge.
For a detailed comparison of the two VA-7 US House candidates, Vindman and Anderson, see:
The Race for the Virginia 7th District US
House of Representatives Seat Between Conservative Republican Candidate
Anderson and Liberal Democrat Candidate Vindman – A Side-by-Side Comparison of
the Two Candidates
https://old-soldier-colonel.blogspot.com/2024/10/the-race-for-virginia-7th-district-us.html?m=1
