Sen. Tommy Tuberville has faced questions for months about his radical holds on U.S. military confirmations, but the Alabama Republican has insisted his support for the armed forces is beyond reproach. “There is nobody more military than me,” the GOP senator said earlier this month.
Even at the time, this was a difficult boast to take seriously. Reading The Washington Post’s latest reporting, it’s even worse now.
For nearly a decade, Tuberville has described the World War II exploits of his father, Charles R. Tuberville Jr., in a relatively consistent way — that he was a tank commander, that he earned five Bronze Stars, that he participated in the D-Day landing and that he lied about his age to join the army. News organizations have tended to accept Tuberville’s version and either reprint or broadcast it. Yet an examination of army histories, newspaper reports and other materials calls into question many of the claims put forth by Tuberville….
The full report is worth reading, but the bottom line is unmistakable: The senator has, over the course of many years, wildly exaggerated his father’s military service. Charles Tuberville did serve in World War II, but some of the details the lawmaker has peddled are demonstrably untrue.
Such mendacity would be unfortunate under any circumstances, but it’s especially regrettable given the Alabama Republican’s larger set of problems.
After all, Tuberville has spent most of 2023 leading an unprecedent fight to stand in the way of military promotions, ignoring concerns that he’s undermining the readiness of his own country’s armed services, while imposing unnecessary hardships on military leaders and their families. What’s more, as a candidate, Tuberville vowed to donate his entire salary to veterans and Alabama, and to date, he hasn’t yet kept that promise.
The senator might’ve thought he could borrow his father’s valor, using it as some kind of political shield against criticisms, but that’s apparently no longer an option.
If the coach-turned-politician were otherwise excelling as an accomplished policymaker on Capitol Hill, it might be easier to overlook this controversial part of his burgeoning record. But that’s plainly not the case: 30 months into Tuberville’s first term, it’s tough to think of a modern senator whose career has had such a ridiculous start.
In hindsight, there were signs he wasn’t quite ready — to borrow a football analogy — to turn pro. As a candidate, Tuberville spent much of his campaign hiding from voters. Upon arriving on Capitol Hill, the first votes the Alabama Republican cast were against certification of the 2020 presidential election results, securing his place in the chamber’s so-called “insurrectionist caucus.”
All the while, Tuberville gave observers plenty of reasons to wonder if he knew what he was talking about. Shortly after getting elected, he flubbed the basics of World War II. He soon after struggled with how recent presidential elections have been resolved.
As regular readers might recall, it wasn’t long before Tuberville made matters worse. He misstated the three branches of the U.S. government. He made the case that Russia invaded Ukraine in order to acquire “more farmland,” which really didn’t make any sense. He also made ugly comments about race, crime, and reparations.
More recently, Tuberville disputed the racism of white nationalists and presented an unsubtle argument that “inner city” school teachers are lazy and possibly illiterate.
If the Republican is going to turn his hapless political career around, he has an enormous amount of work to do. Perhaps Tuberville can start turning things around by ending his blockade and apologizing?
This post updates our related earlier coverage.
