Washington Post fact-checker Glenn Kessler shredded Democratic vice presidential candidate Gov. Tim Walz’s, D-Minn., claim that he once carried weapons of war “in war.”

In an analysis piece of Walz’s military service record, Kessler denied the governor’s 2018 claim that he had handled weapons in a combat theater over his 24-year career in the U.S. Army National guard. The fact-checker confirmed to readers that there was no evidence he served in combat so he couldn’t have carried the weapons. 

“He did carry weapons of war — just not in war,” Kessler declared.

KAMALA HARRIS’ TREATMENT OF STAFF UNDER SCRUTINY AS REPORTS OF POOR OFFICE CULTURE RESURFACE

The governor made the heavily scrutinized claim in question during a 2018 town hall meeting where he advocated for gun control policies.

In a clip of the meeting, which the Harris campaign shared on social media earlier this week, Walz told an audience, “I spent 25 years in the Army and I hunt… And I tell you what I have been doing. I’ve been voting for common sense legislation that protects the Second Amendment, but we can do background checks. We can do CDC research. We can make sure we don’t have reciprocal carry among states. And we can make sure those weapons of war, that I carried in war, is the only place where those weapons are at.”

Kessler’s piece, published on Friday, grilled Walz over the claim, stating, “There is no evidence that Walz served in combat — and he has not claimed he did. He did receive ribbons for proficiency in sharpshooting and hand grenades, according to military records obtained through an open records request by MPR News.”

The Washington Post fact-checker also noted that a Harris campaign spokesperson admitted that “the governor misspoke.”

I SERVED WITH TIM WALZ AS A REPUBLICAN IN THE HOUSE. HE’LL BE A GOOD VICE PRESIDENT

The arena scoreboard at the Liacouras Center, the site of Vice President Kamala Harris’ first rally with her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on August 6, 2024 (Fox News – Paul Steinhauser)

When reached for comment, the Walz campaign provided the following statement to Fox News Digital.

“Governor Walz would never insult or undermine any American’s service to this country — in fact, he thanks Senator Vance for putting his life on the line for our country,” the statement said. “It’s the American way. In making the case for why weapons of war should never be on our streets or in our classrooms, the Governor misspoke. He did handle weapons of war and believes strongly that only military members trained to carry those deadly weapons should have access to them, unlike Donald Trump and JD Vance who prioritize the gun lobby over our children.”

Kessler rendered his final assessment of Walz’s words, saying, “Walz’s language was sloppy and false. He did carry weapons of war — just not in war.”

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Kessler was hardly the first to go after Walz on this claim. Throughout the week, the campaign’s political opponents, social media critics, and even liberal media networks called it out.

GOP vice presidential nominee JD Vance led the Republican attacks on Walz’s “in war” claims. 

He asked on Wednesday, “Well, I wonder, Tim Walz, when were you ever in war? When was this? What was this weapon that you carried into war?” He then went on to say that Walz “has not spent a day in a combat zone.”

CNN correspondent Tom Foreman fact-checked the line on Wednesday, saying there “is no evidence that at any time Governor Walz was in the position of being shot at, and some of his language could easily be seen to suggest that he was. So that is absolutely false when he said that about gun rights out there.”

Judge Tanya Chutkan granted special counsel Jack Smith‘s request on Friday to delay proceedings in his election interference case against former President Donald Trump.

Chutkan postponed a hearing, initially scheduled for next week, until Sept. 5, according to a court order. The judge also pushed out the next deadline for court filings from Friday until the end of August, meaning the first substantive activity in the case likely will not occur until that time.

Both delays came in response to a surprise request from government prosecutors on Thursday to slow proceedings following the Supreme Court thrusting the case into a state of uncertainty with its ruling in July on presidential immunity.

Prior to the ruling, Smith had been eager to move the case along, repeatedly moving to expedite proceedings. At one point last year, for example, Smith asked the high court to step in and rule on immunity before the lower court had made a decision on it, anticipating that Trump would eventually take his argument to the Supreme Court anyways. The justices rejected Smith’s request.

Prosecutors for Smith wrote Thursday in their postponement request that they are continuing to “assess the new precedent set forth last month in the Supreme Court’s decision in Trump v. United States … including through consultation with other Department of Justice components.”

The prosecutors said those consultations were “well underway” but that the DOJ had not yet finalized its position on how to proceed with Trump’s case.

Chutkan’s order came as expected after Trump’s defense team signed onto Smith’s request, signaling the parties were in agreement on pushing the dates out.

Chutkan, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, has taken a relatively aggressive approach to the case by rejecting many of Trump’s prior requests and maintaining a pace with deadlines and hearing dates that some have described as a “rocket docket.”

Within 48 hours of receiving the order from the Supreme Court, Chutkan issued several decisions on it. The choice of the first week of September was of the earliest possible dates she could have chosen and signals she is aiming to continue to move the case along as rapidly as possible after it sat dormant for months while the immunity argument was pending before the Supreme Court.

During the hearing, Chutkan and both parties are set to hammer out a pre-trial schedule, now that the landscape of the case has changed.

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The Supreme Court’s immunity ruling is expected to weaken Smith’s case drastically. The special counsel must now excise key items from his indictment, such as references to Trump’s interactions with his DOJ, so that it aligns with the high court’s decision that certain presidential activities are immune from criminal prosecution and also cannot be used as evidence against Trump.

Smith was supposed to give his first indication on Friday of how he plans to press forward with his charges in the wake of the new complications, but he now has three extra weeks to do this.

First, and most critically, only a small fraction of crypto is used for illicit activity, far less than we see in traditional finance, which according to the United Nations could be up to 5% of global GDP. Per analytics firm Chainalysis, money laundering accounts for less than 0.5% of all crypto transaction flows. This is also decreasing steadily over time. Even as crypto usage rose in 2023, the amount of money laundering in crypto fell from $31.5 billion in 2022 to $22.2 billion in 2023. No significant amount of illicit activity is acceptable, but to single out crypto as the villain is both inaccurate and tired.