Veteran who served in Tim Walz’s battalion says stolen valor accusations are ‘Far darker than people think’

A veteran who served with Kamala Harris running mate Gov. Tim Walz accused him of embellishing his time in the service and abandoning his unit just before they deployed.

In an interview Wednesday on "The Ingraham Angle," Ret. Command Sgt. Maj. Thomas Behrends, who said he was a member of Walz's battalion, scolded the Minnesota governor for misleading the American public about his military career. 

His service concluded when he retired from his unit in the Minnesota National Guard right before they deployed to Iraq in 2005, the New York Post reported. The Minnesota National Guard told Fox News Walz's unit was not given deployment orders to Iraq until July and he had put his retirement papers in five to seven  months prior to his retirement in that May 2005.

Asked about Trump running mate Sen. JD Vance's accusation that Walz is guilty of "stolen valor," the National Guard veteran told Fox News host Laura Ingraham that it's "far darker than a lot of people think."

"He's used the rank that he never achieved in order to advance his political career," he said. "I mean, he still says he's a retired command sergeant major to this day, and he's not. He uses the rank of others to make it look like he's a better person than he is."
Questions emerged about Walz's rhetoric surrounding his time in the service after Vice President Kamala Harris announced him as her running mate on the 2024 Democratic ticket. 

Walz is described as a retired "command sergeant major" in his governor's website biography and has also claimed he carried a gun "in war," despite never experiencing active combat.

Ingraham, however, said the Minnesota National Guard told the "Angle" he retired as a master sergeant.

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