Montana GOP Senate candidate says he lied to ranger about gunshot wound in 2015 -- (Poll: How did that bullet get in his arm?)

Tim Sheehy, a charismatic former Navy SEAL who is the Republican candidate in a U.S. Senate race in Montana that could determine control of the chamber, has cited a gunshot wound he received in combat that he said left a bullet in his right arm as evidence of his toughness.

It was one of several inconsistent accounts Sheehy has shared about being shot while deployed. And in October 2015, more than a year after he left active duty, he told a different story.

After a family visit to Montana’s Glacier National Park, he told a National Park Service ranger that he accidentally shot himself in the right arm that day when his Colt .45 revolver fell and discharged while he was loading his vehicle in the park, according to a record of the episode filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Montana.

The self-inflicted gunshot left a bullet lodged in Sheehy’s right forearm, according to the written description accompanying the federal citation that the ranger, a federal law enforcement officer, gave Sheehy for illegally discharging his weapon in a national park. The citation said the description was based on Sheehy’s telling of events.

Asked this week about the citation, which has not been previously reported, Sheehy told The Washington Post that the statement he gave the ranger was a lie. He said he made up the story about the gun going off to protect himself and his former platoonmates from facing a potential military investigation into an old bullet wound that he said he got in Afghanistan in 2012. He said he did not know for certain whether the wound was the result of friendly fire or from enemy ammunition, and said he never reported the incident to his superiors.

Sheehy said he did not shoot himself in the park in 2015, but rather fell and hurt himself on a hike, necessitating a trip to an emergency room, where he said he told hospital staff he had a bullet in his arm, triggering his interview with the ranger.

Senate Candidate Tells Different Story of Navy Discharge Than His Book Does​

Tim Sheehy, the Navy SEAL running to unseat Democratic Montana Sen. Jon Tester, has repeatedly told voters he was “discharged” from the military for medical reasons, owing to wounds sustained in service.

But the Republican’s own autobiography, published just last year, says otherwise; he wrote that he became disillusioned with military personnel policies and left of his own accord after being injured in a training accident.

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In April, as Sheehy’s campaign to unseat Tester warmed up, The Washington Postreported that the version of Sheehy’s departure from the Navy in his autobiography differed from a résumé he submitted to the Montana legislature in 2021 that said he was “medically separated from active duty due to wounds received in Afghanistan.”

A spokesperson for Sheehy told the paper: “Sheehy was honorably discharged from the Navy after being declared medically unfit to continue to serve as a Navy SEAL.”

But that statement is also contradicted by Sheehy’s own written account: He says he chose to leave the Navy rather than complete a spell of desk jobs before a possible return to active duty.

Sheehy won the GOP primary, so he faces Tester in November.

What is it with this guy and Glacier National Park?

National parks, military dispute Sheehy’s claim that he parachuted into Glacier​

Over 35 seasons working as a ranger in Glacier National Park, Kim Peach, 67, recalls only two incidents in which he responded to a report of a gun being fired — and both became his most memorable days on the job.

Last spring, Peach shared his account of ticketing Sheehy $525 for discharging a weapon in Glacier National Park in October of 2015 with The Washington Post — an account that was backed up by U.S. District Court and national park documents from the incident. The Post allowed him to speak on the condition of anonymity at the time because he feared political retaliation. But Laura Loomer and other conservative pundits quickly shared his identity online after the story published, leading to harassment, Peach said.

Now, angry at what he sees as Sheehy’s refusal to own up to the truth, Peach is speaking on the record to lend weight to his account of what happened nine years ago.

Sheehy told The Post that he sought medical attention that day because he fell during a hike and feared he had dislodged a bullet in his arm from Afghanistan that he had never reported to his superiors, for fear of sparking an investigation into its origins.

Peach finds that hard to believe. “The truth isn’t complicated,” he said.

[Peach was responding to shots fired] The dispatcher later directed Peach to a hospital instead, saying the person who accidentally shot himself was there, according to the ranger’s memory and his written report at the time. Sheehy, then a young businessman on a hike with his family, told Peach at the hospital he had accidentally shot himself with his Colt .45 revolver after it fell off a pile of gear in the back of his vehicle and fired.

[Peach noted a spent casing in Sheehy's revolver]

His story that day seemed eminently believable to Peach. The only other incident where a gun fired in the park that he responded to involved someone accidentally firing a bullet into his own leg.

[Sheehy's] campaign initially said in the spring that Sheehy was seeking hospital records from 2015 to verify his account, but later ignored questions from The Post about whether he had obtained those records or would release them.

essentialsaltes said:

In April, as Sheehy’s campaign to unseat Tester warmed up, The Washington Postreported that the version of Sheehy’s departure from the Navy in his autobiography differed from a résumé he submitted to the Montana legislature in 2021 that said he was “medically separated from active duty due to wounds received in Afghanistan.”

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Montana Senate candidate says he was 'medically discharged' from the Navy. Records say otherwise.​

his discharge paperwork tells a different story.

The heavily redacted, two-page document obtained by NBC News indicates that Sheehy voluntarily resigned his commission and does not list any medical condition that forced him out of uniform, according to a review of the document and a current and former U.S. official familiar with the details of his separation.

Scrutiny of Republican Tim Sheehy’s business grows amid US Senate race​

Sheehy’s Bridger Aerospace, a company he founded in 2013, negotiated a deal with Gallatin county in eastern Montana to use its pristine credit rating to raise $160m in bonds. The county was meant to benefit from Bridger’s plans to hire more workers and build two new aircraft hangars.

But the company used most of the money, or $134m, from the 2022 bond issue to pay back previous investment from Blackstone, a New York-based investment giant.

The questions around Gallatin county’s approval of Bridger’s bond deal revolve around whether the board was correctly informed of the company’s financial position – it has lost $150m since it was founded – and whether Gallatin’s credit rating could be affected.

Zach Brown, a Gallatin county commissioner, told NBC he was not worried that the bond money had gone to pay Blackstone.

“Our role is not to monitor whether they added jobs – it is to endorse the public interest of their project.”

essentialsaltes said:

[Sheehy's] campaign initially said in the spring that Sheehy was seeking hospital records from 2015 to verify his account, but later ignored questions from The Post about whether he had obtained those records or would release them.

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GOP candidate Tim Sheehy says medical records don’t exist for gunshot wound​

Tim Sheehy, the Montana Republican nominee for Senate, said in an interview with former Fox News host Megyn Kelly that there are no medical records that would prove he did not accidentally shoot himself in the arm in Glacier National Park in 2015.

Sheehy’s contention that records from his hospital visit do not exist is new.