WSJ in 2006: Walz Retired as ‘Master Sergeant’; False Claims Continued

The Wall Street Journal reported, accurately, in 2006 that then-congressional candidate Tim Walz retired from the Army National Guard as a master sergeant (E-8), but he kept claiming he retired as a command sergeant major (E-9).

As Breitbart News has noted, Walz served briefly as a command sergeant major but retired as a master sergeant after failing to complete the requirements for the higher rank.

The Journal cited Walz’s rank in a March 30, 2006 article as “master sergeant.” Walz had already referred to himself, during a speech among veterans running for Congress a month before, as a “retired command sergeant major,” which was not correct.

Walz continued to cite the wrong retirement rank, even after the Journal‘s reporting. In a letter to the Mankato Free Press in which he defend his service record, he wrote: “For the record, I served 24 years in the Army National Guard and retired as a command sergeant major in May of 2005. I served in three NATO training missions to the Arctic and deployed in support of Operation Enduring Freedom, serving in Italy in 2003-2004.”

Many outlets, and supporters, continued to report that Walz was a retired command sergeant major. Bizarrely, the Veterans for Common Sense organization referred to Walz as “Command Sgt. Major (ret.) Walz” even while citing the Journal article directly in a block quote that clearly referred to Walz as a “retired master sergeant.”

The New York Times appeared to split the difference, calling Walz a “retired command sergeant.”

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of “”The Agenda: What Trump Should Do in His First 100 Days,” available for pre-order on Amazon. He is also the author of “The Trumpian Virtues: The Lessons and Legacy of Donald Trump’s Presidency,” now available on Audible. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.