GOP Senate candidate Mike McCalister is facing more questions about his military service, this time from a Vietnam veteran.
According to the St. Petersburg Times, former Army Captain Ed Maxwell, who served a 19-month combat tour in Vietnam, said:
All of Mike McCalister’s enlisted service was limited to reserve component Active Duty for training going though his initial basic training, and attending 2 week training periods with his units. Only active duty performed in an active component unit, or as a member of a mobilized Guard or Reserve unit counted for veterans’ status during the Vietnam era. McCalister did not qualify for veterans status until 1992, after serving a 2 years as an ROTC instructor at Florida A&M University as a major.
Maxwell, a member of the Fort Lauderdale chapter of Vietnam Veterans of America, told the Times, “I have had it with McCalister’s charges and innuendos against us. I can not conclusively prove Mike’s actual motives for initially joining the Guard in 1971, but I can offer some strong evidence to base conclusions on.”
According to an article published last week by The Miami Herald, a veterans group “that calls itself ‘Stolen Valor‘ has been asking McCalister about his record for more than a month. They haven’t gotten anywhere, but McCallister quietly changed facts and toned down his rhetoric on his website.”
