The new Democratic candidate for vice president, Minnesota’s Governor Tim Walz, has faced strong criticism for his decision to retire from the Army National Guard just before his unit received orders to deploy to Iraq in 2005. 

The Republican vice-presidential candidate, Senator J. D. Vance (R-OH), took particular exception to a clip recently posted on X by the Harris campaign. In the clip, Walz—discussing gun control—said that politicians should “make sure those weapons of war, that I carried in war, are only carried in war.” Vance, who served in the Marines and deployed to Iraq, called it “stolen valor garbage,” saying, “When I got the call to go to Iraq, I went. Tim Walz said he carried a gun in a war. Did he? No. It was a lie.”

Walz enlisted in the Army National Guard at the age of 17. During the course of his service, he did not enter combat, although he did deploy for six months to Italy during the invasion of Iraq in 2003. By 2005, he had served for 24 years and achieved the rank of command sergeant major in the 1st Battalion, 125th Field Artillery. In February of the same year, he filed paperwork to run for Congress in Minnesota, where he lived and worked as a geography teacher for Makato High School. 

While some have claimed that Walz did not know about his battalion’s future deployment before his retirement—he retired some months before his unit was mobilized—in March 2005 his campaign released a press statement informing the public of his intention to continue his run for office despite a potential deployment to Iraq. The statement read, “As Command Sergeant Major I have a responsibility not only to ready my battalion for Iraq, but also to serve if called on…. I don’t want to speculate on what shape my campaign will take if I am deployed, but I have no plans to drop out of the race.”

In May 2005, Walz retired from the Army National Guard two months later as a master sergeant, not having held the position of command sergeant major for a sufficient period of time to qualify for retirement at that rank. In August, his battalion was mobilized for deployment to Iraq, another soldier taking Walz’s place as command sergeant major of the unit.