Source: Politics<\/p>\n
The controversy around Donald Trump\u2019s visit to a memorial service at Arlington National Cemetery earlier this week has once again thrust the military to the forefront of the 2024 presidential contest.<\/p>\n
What was intended to highlight a potential vulnerability on Kamala Harris\u2019 vice presidential record \u2014 the U.S. military\u2019s pullout from Afghanistan in 2021, during which 13 American service members were killed and dozens more were injured \u2014 backfired on Trump, as his campaign faced allegations of physically pushing a cemetery staff member and breaking federal law in using cemetery grounds for political purposes.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s the latest incident in recent weeks of the military being used as a political cudgel on the campaign trail, in a race where neither presidential candidate served in the military but both selected veterans as their running mates.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s part of a decadeslong political playbook.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere’s always, I think, a political instinct to lean into respect for the U.S. military, because it’s a binding moral foundation,\u201d said Rep. Jake Auchincloss<\/a> (D-Mass.), who served in the Marines before running for office. \u201cThat’s why attacks based on disrespect for it are tempting for political operators.\u201d<\/p>\n Sometimes those incidents included real national security and military decisions, especially for incumbent presidents and their cabinets, but not always.<\/p>\n Think back to scandals that still reverberate in the American political imagination: Benghazi, the 2012 attack on U.S. facilities in Libya<\/a> that became a major political liability for Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton; the vote to go to war with Iraq<\/a>, which followed Clinton and President Joe Biden for decades; and the \u201cSwift Boat<\/a> campaign\u201d against John Kerry\u2019s military record that\u2019s become political shorthand for an unfair attack.<\/p>\n In 1992, George H.W. Bush slammed his opponent, Bill Clinton, as a draft dodger<\/a>. In 1988, Michael Dukakis bashed Bush for the Iran\u2013Contra Affair and staged a photo-op in a tank to cast himself as a capable military leader \u2014 though the plan went sideways<\/a> when his huge helmet and grin looked more silly than strong. Bush, a World War II hero, ran an ad of the photo that helped sink the Democrat\u2019s campaign.<\/p>\n \u201cDukakis, of course, was doing that to show that he was tough and cared about national security, but he looked goofy in the hat, and it just it backfired on him,\u201d said Peter Feaver, a Duke University professor who previously served as an aide for the White House National Security Council. \u201cAnd I would say Trump has struggled mightily with this as well, in terms of meeting the ceremonial moment with the seriousness, the respect, the circumspection, reflection that the moment requires.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cPresidents have to pass the commander-in-chief test,\u201d Feaver added. \u201cThey have to meet some minimum threshold that yes, they could be trusted to be commander in chief, they could be trusted with the nuclear arsenal, with the lives of our men and women who serve in uniform.\u201d<\/p>\n The Army said in a statement Thursday that while Trump was at a wreath-laying ceremony to honor service members who were killed during the Afghanistan pullout, at the invitation of some of the service members\u2019 families, members of Trump\u2019s campaign team \u201cabruptly pushed aside\u201d and \u201cunfairly attacked<\/a>\u201d a staff member who had attempted to stop a campaign photographer from taking photos of Trump at the service members\u2019 grave sites. The campaign was \u201caware of federal laws, Army regulations and DoD policies, which clearly prohibit political activities on cemetery grounds,\u201d the Army said, defending its staffer.<\/p>\n NPR first reported<\/a> the incident. The staffer is not pressing charges, according to the Army, which considers the matter closed.<\/p>\n Trump campaign spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said in a statement defending the former president\u2019s visit that there \u201chas been no greater advocate for our brave military men and women\u201d than Trump. Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung directed POLITICO to a 2020 Biden campaign ad<\/a> that shows the president standing at a service member’s grave.<\/p>\n Harris campaign spokesperson Michael Tyler called the Arlington incident \u201cpretty sad\u201d but \u201cnot surprising\u201d in a CNN interview on Wednesday, and spokesperson James Singer referred POLITICO to the line in the vice president\u2019s Democratic National Convention speech last week promising to \u201cfulfill our sacred obligation to care for our troops and their families, and I will always honor and never disparage their service and their sacrifice.\u201d<\/p>\n When President Joe Biden was still the Democratic nominee, Trump\u2019s campaign aired an ad<\/a> showing the president checking his watch at a 2021 ceremony honoring the soldiers who died during the Afghanistan withdrawal. And at the Republican National Convention last month, some of the service members\u2019 family members appeared on stage to slam him.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen you’re honoring those who have passed, who\u2019ve died in service of their country, that is the most ceremonial [part of the presidency] to the point it\u2019s often talked about in sacred terms: \u2018Hallowed ground,\u2019 \u2018It\u2019s holy,\u2019\u201d Feaver said. \u201cThe people who want to be president need to show that in that moment, they can rise to the occasion.\u201d<\/p>\n With Harris replacing Biden at the top of the Democratic ticket, her role in the Afghanistan withdrawal is likely to be raised by Republicans through Election Day.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s going to be a very significant liability [for Harris], particularly when she says \u2018I was the last person in the room and I absolutely approved of the plan,\u2019\u201d said veteran Republican strategist Charlie Gerow. \u201cThat, to me, is game, set and match on that score.\u201d<\/p>\n Trump\u2019s campaign has also sought to undermine the service record of Harris\u2019 running mate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, whom Ohio Sen. JD Vance<\/a>, Trump\u2019s running mate, has accused of \u201cstolen valor.\u201d Walz, who served for 24 years in the Minnesota National Guard and retired from the military to run for Congress shortly before his troop deployed to Iraq, has brushed aside the criticism.<\/p>\n \u201cMy record speaks for itself,\u201d he said Thursday on CNN.<\/p>\n The critiques on Walz\u2019s service record echo back to the 2004 presidential campaign, when then-candidate George W. Bush\u2019s service in the Texas Air National Guard was questioned. That scandal culminated in CBS News publishing a series of documents<\/a> the network\u2019s source had fabricated \u2014 the basis for the 2015 film \u201cTruth.\u201d During the same campaign, John Kerry\u2019s record was also questioned in a \u201cswift boat\u201d attack engineered by Chris LaCivita, who now serves as a senior adviser to Trump\u2019s campaign.<\/p>\n But Trump is also vulnerable when it comes to service members and veterans, with a track record that includes reports that he called them \u201csuckers and losers<\/a>\u201d \u2014 which he denies \u2014 and saying Sen. John McCain, who was a prisoner of war, was \u201cnot a war hero\u201d because of his capture. Earlier this month, Trump drew criticism from veterans groups<\/a> for saying the country\u2019s top civilian honor was \u201cmuch better\u201d than its top military honor because the service members who receive the latter are \u201cin very bad shape\u201d or \u201cdead.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThose are things he can\u2019t erase \u2014 those are stains, indelible stains, and nothing Vance says or does can overcome that,\u201d Feaver said.<\/p>\n But Gerow said he doesn\u2019t think it will impact Trump\u2019s share of the military vote. \u201cIt didn’t make any difference in the previous two cycles. He won the lion’s share of the veteran vote and the military vote, and I think he’ll do it again this time,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n