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New York Times Vietnam story
On May 17, 2010, The New York Times published an article citing several speeches by Blumenthal in which he claimed to have served in the Vietnam War. The article reported that Blumenthal, a member of the Marine Corps Reserve, “obtained at least five military deferments from 1965 to 1970 and took repeated steps that enabled him to avoid going to war.”[62][63] (On June 30, 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson issued Executive Order 11360, mandating that no deferments for post-graduate study be granted in the future, except for those men pursuing medical and dental courses.)[64] Several news sources, including The News-Times, reported similar claims by Blumenthal.[65] Shortly after the article was published, Republican Senate candidate Linda McMahon announced that her campaign research team had found the footage and provided the story to The New York Times.[66]

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“In Vietnam we had to endure taunts and insults, and no one said, ‘Welcome home.’ I say welcome home.”

“We have learned something important since the days that I served in Vietnam.”

“When we returned, we saw nothing like this. Let us do better by this generation of men and women.”

“I wore the uniform in Vietnam and many came back to all kinds of disrespect. Whatever we think of war, we owe the men and women of the armed forces our unconditional support.”

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[edit]Public response
In response to the findings, Blumenthal was criticized by many political sources, including the Huffington Post,[67] Slate,[68] the New York Daily News,[69] The Washington Post,[70] and USA Today.[71] One of Blumenthal’s Republican opponents, Vietnam veteran Rob Simmons, stated that he was “deeply troubled by allegations that [Blumenthal] has misrepresented his service.”[72] Politico contested one of the speeches cited in the Times article, reporting that Blumenthal had accurately described his service earlier in the speech.[73] Connecticut’s The Day newspaper, meanwhile, stated that its staff could find no articles in its archives with any suggestion that Blumenthal served in Vietnam.[74]

In the same article, the Times wrote that there was no record of Blumenthal’s tenure on the swim team at Harvard University, even though several biographies had described him as the team’s captain.[62] Photos and interviews from Harvard swimmers revealed that Blumenthal had been on the swim team. No official records or group yearbook photos could be found from Harvard’s athletic department, however.[75]

After the Times story was published, Rasmussen Reports indicated that Blumenthal’s lead over his principal GOP rival, Linda McMahon, had shrunk to three percentage points.[76]

Blumenthal’s executive officer, Larry Baldino, responded to the Times story with a letter to the editor of the New Haven Register, in which he acknowledged the statements were ‘misleading’ but dismissed the outcry as ‘petty.’ Baldino further defended Blumenthal as ‘good natured’ and described him as ‘one of the best Marines with whom I ever worked.’[77]

[edit]Political rebound
In a speech at a VFW Post on May 18, Blumenthal stated that his comment under question was an “unintentional and rare misstatement”, and that he is proud of and has been clear about his service in the Marine Corps Reserve. The Veterans of Foreign Wars organization later released a statement noting that VFW “did not sanction and was not, in fact, aware that the press conference was going to be held at a VFW Post.”[78] He was rebuked by Richard DiFederico, Commander of the Connecticut VFW chapter, who stated that “Those who served in uniform during the Vietnam era also deserve our gratitude, which makes Mr. Blumenthal’s claim to be something he is not so outrageous. It diminishes the service of all who served and sacrificed, most especially those whose names are inscribed on the Vietnam Wall.”[79]

On May 21, Blumenthal received the Democratic nomination by acclamation for Senator of Connecticut, after opposing candidate Alpert was not allowed to speak at the convention by the committee, except to withdraw his name for nomination after preparing a speech.[80][81]

Days after the nomination, Quinnipiac University polling indicated that Blumenthal held a 25-point lead over McMahon.[82] The Cook Political Report changed its prediction on the race to Leans Democratic, making Blumenthal the favored candidate over McMahon.[83]

[edit]Enlistment in the Marine Corps Reserve
Blumenthal later told The Connecticut Mirror that he did not want to avoid service in Vietnam when he joined the Marine Corps Reserve, saying “I did realize reservists could be called up, and that was something that I wanted to do.”[84] Blumenthal did not recall his specific draft number, but said it was probably high enough to avoid the draft. Research revealed that his draft number was 152. People with numbers as high as 195 in the December 1969 lottery were eligible for the draft. David Curry, an expert on the Vietnam draft, suggested that Blumenthal may have enlisted in the Reserve because at the time, it held no expectation of being activated, and allowed him to avert a pick by lottery.[84]

[edit]Criticism

In 2007, Hans Bader, Counsel for Special Projects of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (a libertarian think-tank) ranked Blumenthal as “the nation’s worst state attorney general”, based on “a set of explicit criteria — such as encroachment on the powers of other branches of government, meddling in the affairs of other states or federal agencies, encouragement of judicial activism and frivolous lawsuits, favoritism towards campaign contributors, ethical breaches, and failure to provide representation to state agencies or to provide legal advice.” Bader singled out Blumenthal for his role in the 1998 tobacco settlement and state efforts to regulate carbon dioxide in other states through lawsuits against out-of-state companies.[85] Former Congressman Rob Simmons, one of Blumenthal’s Republican opponents for U.S. Senator from Connecticut, circulated the document on his campaign website, charging Blumenthal with “supporting meritless, politically-driven lawsuits.”[86]

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