Walz can’t seem to help himself. He’s been caught lying about nearly everything under the sun.
And Tim Walz was blindsided after a state official attacks him for spewing yet another lie.
Minnesota Governor Tim Walz finds himself under scrutiny once again as an old controversy regarding his past resurfaces.
A letter from 2006, written by the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce, has come back into the spotlight just as Walz campaigns for the vice-presidential spot alongside Kamala Harris.
In his 2006 run for Congress, Walz highlighted an alleged award from the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce on his campaign website.
According to a report by the Post Bulletin at the time, he claimed to have received the award in 1993 for his contributions to the business community. However, this claim has since been debunked.
The truth came to light when Barry L. Kennedy, then-president of the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce, addressed Walz in a sharply worded letter. The letter, dated November 1, 2006, made it clear that Walz had never been the recipient of any such honor from their organization.
“We researched this matter and can confirm that you have not been the recipient of any award from the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce,” Kennedy wrote.
The letter also urged Walz to remove the misleading information from his biography, cautioning that it could be seen as an unintended endorsement of his candidacy.
Kennedy further pointed out that Walz’s opponent, Congressman Gil Gutknecht, had in fact been endorsed by the US Chamber of Commerce for his support of small business issues.
The resurfacing of this letter was brought to public attention by Minnesota outlet Alpha News last week, reminding voters of the controversy that made headlines in 2006. At the time, Walz’s campaign quickly updated his website to correct the error, stating that the award in question came from the Nebraska Junior Chamber of Commerce, also known as the Jaycees, rather than the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce. The campaign manager chalked it up to a “typographical error,” a defense reported by local outlets at the time.
When asked for comment about the resurfaced controversy, the Harris-Walz campaign responded by emphasizing Walz’s candid and spontaneous communication style. “Governor Walz speaks the way real people speak — openly and off the cuff. The American people appreciate that Gov. Walz tells it like it is and doesn’t talk like a politician, and they appreciate the difference between someone who occasionally misspeaks and a pathological liar like Donald Trump,” the campaign said.
This incident adds to a series of claims regarding Walz’s alleged pattern of exaggerating or misrepresenting aspects of his background. One of the most prominent criticisms comes from veterans who accuse him of distorting details of his military service.
Walz spent 24 years in the Army National Guard, retiring in 2005 before embarking on a successful congressional career, representing Minnesota in the US House from 2007 to 2019.
However, his military record has been a point of contention, with critics claiming he falsely portrayed himself as a retired “command sergeant major.”
Walz did earn the rank of command sergeant major following a deployment to Italy in 2004, but he did not complete the necessary coursework at the US Army Sergeants Major Academy to maintain that rank in retirement. Instead, Walz officially retired as a master sergeant, a rank one level below command sergeant major.
The misrepresentation has not gone unnoticed. Hung Cao, a Republican Senate candidate from Virginia and a retired Navy captain, voiced his disapproval, saying, “For 20 years, they let this guy go by with a lie that he deployed to Iraq, which he didn’t, and that he retired as a command sergeant major, which he did not. I mean, that’s just blatant lies,” Cao told the New York Post.
Further complicating matters, the battalion commander of Walz’s former Minnesota Army National Guard unit recently released a strong statement criticizing Walz’s portrayal of his military career, especially his use of the “retired Command Sergeant Major” title.
As these accusations continue to surface, the Harris-Walz campaign faces increasing pressure to address concerns about the authenticity of Walz’s record. For now, the debate over his past remains a sticking point as he and Vice President Harris look to win the White House this fall.
Stay tuned to The Federalist Wire.