LTP News Sharing:
AP Photo/Matt Rourke
In
a devastating development, current Kamala Harris running mate
Tim Walz’s former unit commander appeared on CNN and completely
blew up the scandal surrounding the abandoning of his unit
before its deployment to Iraq.
For
days, the mainstream press has claimed that Walz did not know
about the deployment before deciding to retire early and run for
Congress. Command Sargent Major Doug Julin, who was the
now-Minnesota governor’s direct report, went
through the timeline with Laura Coates. Not only did Walz know
about the deployment, but he had committed to go. It was only
after he went around Julin that he was able to secure his
retirement, leaving his unit hamstrung just months before they
shipped out.
The
CNN host did her level best to push back at points and offer
“clarifications” in Walz’s favor, but Julin held his ground and
gave the facts, inconvenient as they may be for the Harris
campaign and the press:
The
full video is fairly long, but here are some of the key excerpts
courtesy of Newsbusters.
Julin
recalled a March 2005 meeting where Walz “came in, we sat and
talked, he told me, he says, I have not been nominated, I am
going forward with the battalion. I said, ‘Good, let’s go.’ We
got the team built, and we’re starting to build the team out
there.”Fast
forward to June and, “I walked into the team, the meeting
hall, and Tom
Behrends was there, and I asked Tom what he
was doing there. And that’s when he informed me that he had
quit. The issue that came out of this was, first of all,
how did Tim Walz quit without discussing with me, because I
was his next level of leadership, or responsibility, or
supervisor.”Coates
interrupted, “Excuse me, you’re using the word ‘quit.’ I don’t
want to cut you off, sir, but — excuse me, Sargent Major, I
just want to be precise in the language. You’re using the word
quit. You mean that he had opted to retire still, is that
right? He had not somehow gone AWOL or been dishonestly
discharged in some way. He opted to retire.”
Julin
would go on to explain that the proper procedure was for
Walz to come to him to request authorization to retire.
Instead, he went around Julin and found someone further up the
chain of command to back his play. That left his unit
high and dry as they were fully expecting him to be there to
help lead on the deployment.
By
this point, the testimony being shared was crushing for the
current talking points so Coates tried to redirect. Julin wasn’t
having any of it, though.
Coates
was not convinced any of that matters for the current
political controversy surrounding Walz, “But in the way that
he has handled how he decided to retire, I do wonder what you
make of the way his retirement is being characterized now by
political figures and others who are saying that, somehow, he
has stolen valor, number one, or that his retirement was an
abandonment of his duties. How do you feel about the
experience that you are describing to us right now being
described as political talking points?”Julin
held firm and insisted Walz knew better, “Tim Walz knew the
processes and the procedures. He went around me and above
and beyond me and went — and basically went to get somebody
to back him, to get him out of there without — it was just
a backdoor process that he handled against me or against the
battalion out there.”
Again,
Coates tried to gloss over what was being said, suggesting that
Walz’s retirement wasn’t an issue. Julin then directly said, “No,
he did something wrong in service.” He also noted that
Walz went around him because had he come to Julin, the
answer would have been no. It was just too late in the
game to let Walz skip out on his men.
Julin
claimed the former, “No, he did something wrong in service, as
I stated before. He knew the policies and procedures and how
we go to leadership and address issues or discuss issues and
concerns out there. Again, backing up, he had told me, ‘No,
I’m going forward, we’re going to go with the battalion, and
go from there.’ So, I’m under the belief; he told me he was
going forward…He went around me, which he should have
addressed it with me so he could help me with some things out
there.”He
also theorized that Walz went around him because there was a
possibility he would say no, “the fact is that there’s a
possibility he probably would have realized I would have
probably said, ‘no, it’s too late, you’re going forward,’
because we’d already received our notification of sourcing.
And there’s one other little point out there that people say,
well, he hadn’t been notified yet. Yes, he had been notified.”
Coates
was scrambling for a way out by that point in the interview. She
interjected and ended the interview, not allowing Julin to
finish. That’s unfortunate, but enough of the truth was told to
still be a bombshell. This counters all the excuses being made,
including the idea that Walz was oblivious to the coming
deployment when he put in his retirement papers.
Further,
because Julin was there and part of the command structure, his
credibility is unimpeachable. If the Harris campaign and its
supporters want to keep pushing this issue, they will now have
to call a soldier who served with and led Walz a liar. If that’s
what the Democratic Party and its media allies would like to do,
let’s see them do it.
Keep
in mind, this is a different issue than Walz’s alleged
stolen valor, which has also been a damning indictment of
his past. That is a story that keeps gaining momentum as well.
