CNN anchor Jim Acosta on Wednesday corrected Democratic Minnesota Sen. Tina Smith live on-air as she falsely suggested vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance never served in the military.
Smith said she was “unaware” of Vance serving in the military in an attempt to praise presumptive Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz’s service in the Army National Guard. Acosta pointed out that Vance enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps. and served time in the Iraq War.
“Well here is Tim Walz who enlisted when he was 17 years old. He served in the National Guard for 24 years and I’m not aware of any military service that J.D. Vance has ever served, so let’s just make the comparison there,” Smith told Acosta.
“Well, he was in the Marines,” Acosta interjected, to which Smith accepted.
Top Harris surrogate is unaware of JD Vance’s military service: pic.twitter.com/Bw0Fg2lvrE
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) August 7, 2024
Vance enlisted in the Marine Corps. in 2003 and served in Iraq as a combat correspondent for six months in late 2005, before later becoming a military journalist, according to an excerpt of his bestselling memoir, “Hillbilly Elegy.” The Ohio senator credited his service in the Marine Corps. with shaping him into who he is today.
“I was mad at my mother and father, mad that I rode the bus to school while other kids caught rides with friends, mad that my clothes didn’t come from Abercrombie, mad that my grandfather died, mad that we lived in a small house. That resentment didn’t vanish in an instant, but as I stood and surveyed the mass of children of a war-torn nation, their school without running water, and the overjoyed boy, I began to appreciate how lucky I was: born in the greatest country on earth, every modern convenience at my fingertips, supported by two loving hillbillies, and part of a family that, for all its quirks, loved me unconditionally.”
“At that moment, I resolved to be the type of man who would smile when someone gave him an eraser. I haven’t quite made it there, but without that day in Iraq, I wouldn’t be trying,” Vance continued. (RELATED: Tim Walz’s Wife Said She Wanted To Smell Firs Of 2020 BLM Riots Because It Was A ‘Touchstone’ Moment)
Veterans accused Walz of abandoning his National Guard battalion after learning they would be deployed to Iraq, according to the New York Post.
“On May 16th, 2005, [Walz] quit, betraying his country, leaving the 1-125th Field Artillery Battalion and its Soldiers hanging; without its senior Non-Commissioned Officer, as the battalion prepared for war,” retired Command Sergeants Major Thomas Behrends and Paul Herr wrote in a 2018 letter posted to Facebook, according to the Post.
Vance said Walz’s exit from the National Guard and claims that fighting in combat is “shameful” during a Wednesday press conference.
“When the United States Marine Corps., when the United States of America asked me to serve my country, I did it. I did what they asked me to do and I did it honorably and I’m very proud of that service,” Vance 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 has been criticized for aggressively by a lot of the people that he served with. I think it’s shameful.”
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