BOTH Sheriff Candidates in Texas County Accused of “Stolen Valor”

Clyde Texas is a small town of fewer than 4,000 people in Callahan County, not far from Abilene. The good people of Callahan County have a real head-scratcher on their hands. They have to vote for a new sheriff…and BOTH candidates have been accused of “misrepresenting their military records” aka: Stolen Valor.

The 2 candidates are Leroy Foley, a member of the Clyde Police Department and Rick Jowers who is deputy under the current sheriff who is not seeking re-election.

Ok. Things are about to get wild and maybe a little confusing.

Candidate Foley was called out by a website called militaryphony.com for implying in his campaign signs that he was a silver star and purple heart recipient.

Also, the site claims, Foley claimed on social media that he was an Airborne Ranger for 11 years.

According to Militaryphonies, Foley’s army discharge papers don’t reflect ANY of that.

More damning, though, is that Foley declined to make public comment and resigned from the police department. After he was put on leave while the department conducted its own investigation.

Then, Foley’s opponent, Rick Jowers, was called out for saying in a public forum that he, too, was an Airborne Ranger. Jowers has acknowledged making the claim, apologized for making it…BUT said that he only said it as a way of mocking his opponent, Foley.

Gee…it doesn’t really SEEM like he was mocking his opponent. Maybe Rick Jowers just has an extremely dry sense of humor. That probably explains why he also claimed to have taken a bullet AND been a staff sergeant (both claims that were debunked by militaryphony.com.

Whooo-boy! I guess it could only look worse if it turned out that Jowers had actually only served a few months before deserting and being given an “other than honorable” discharge from the army. Well, it is worse because that’s exactly what militaryphonys.com claims!

So…I guess we’re back to Foley being the better candidate? I mean, he might have embellished his record a little but at least he wasn’t a deserter, right? Uh…right? I guess anything could be possible at this point.

While Leroy Foley has done a pretty thorough job of scrubbing his candidacy from social media, Rick Jowers candidate Facebook is still up. Although, most of it seems to be a half a dozen relatives vowing support and the rest of the page visitors dunking on him repeatedly.

Gowers says that he is still running for sheriff because “I haven’t broken any laws” which seems like an awfully low bar for someone who wants to be, you know, IN CHARGE of enforcing the law. Military Phonies, though, is quick to point out that the Stolen Valor Act says it actually IS a crime to misrepresent one’s military service. Oh, well. All on the learning curve toward becoming sheriff in Callahan County I suppose.