The new Democratic vice presidential candidate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, was heavily criticized for his decision to withdraw from the Army National Guard shortly before his unit received orders to deploy to Iraq in 2005.

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

Walz joined the Army National Guard at age 17. He did not participate in combat during his service, but was deployed to Italy for six months during the 2003 invasion of Iraq. By 2005, he had served 24 years and reached the rank of command sergeant major in the 1st Battalion, 125th Field Artillery. In February of that year, he filed his papers to run for Congress in Minnesota, where he lived and worked as a geography teacher at Makato High School.

Some say Walz was unaware of his battalion’s future deployment before his retirement—he retired several months before his unit was to be mobilized—but in March 2005, his campaign released a press release informing the public of his intention to continue running despite a possible deployment to Iraq. The statement read: “As Command Sergeant Major, I have the responsibility not only to prepare my battalion for Iraq, but also to serve if needed…I do not want to speculate on what form 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 because he had not held the position of command sergeant major long enough to qualify for retirement at that rank. In August, his battalion was mobilized for deployment to Iraq, and another soldier took Walz’s place as the unit’s command sergeant major.