Official Guest Host Gulbransen Questions Why General Kurt Winstead and Gov. Lee Will Not Take a Solid Stance on COVID-19 Vaccine Mandates for Tennessee National Guard

Live from Music Row Tuesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed official guest host Aaron Gulbransen in-studio to discuss why TN-5 candidate General Kurt Winstead will not initiate help for Tennessee guardsmen about to lose their jobs, or answer any real questions directly.

Leahy: In-studio, the official guest host of The Tennessee Star Report and the lead political reporter for The Tennessee Star, Aaron Gulbransen.

And Aaron, you know, you broke a really big story last week that is reverberating around the state, and that is the fact that we’re just a couple of days away from losing about 10 percent of the Tennessee National Guard for those who refuse to take the COVID-19 vaccine.

There will be a rally tomorrow at 11:30 a.m. at the Legislative Plaza to ask Governor Lee to stop those dismissals. So far, nothing from Governor Lee. I see no indication that Governor Lee is going to take any action. Do you see any indication he’s going to take any action?

Gulbransen: I have spoken with a few legislators who say, and this is completely in private, but the sense is that they don’t expect him to do anything, either.

Leahy: No. Let’s look at this in order to be fair to the government. Now, I think he should step in. I think he’s got the authority to step in because the Tennessee National Guard is under his authority until they’re deployed. But he’s not doing it.

But I will say this in fairness to him. I don’t think any other governor in the state has taken that stand, although others have pushed back against it in ways that he hasn’t.

Our own Neil W. McCabe, our national political editor, has this very interesting report on what other governors are doing. The Star News Network has investigated how different states and National Guards have dealt with the COVID-19 mandate.

(McCabe clip plays)

Leahy: What a great report by our national political editor Neil W. McCabe. Now, there is an element of this, Aaron, that plays into the race in the 5th Congressional District in Tennessee for the GOP nomination.

Now, the person who I think is most readily identified as a member of the Tennessee National Guard is retired Brigadier General Kurt Winstead. You wrote a story, you talked to almost all of the candidates about this.

His response was, I think, one of the most muted responses. He stated opposition to the dismissal of the Guard members, but he neglected to call for any action in support of the Guard members’ jobs.

Here’s what that statement from his campaign said. “General Winstead retired in February 2021 prior to the vaccines being mandatory for military members. He opposes the dismissal of military members due to COVID-19 vaccine refusal.

The COVID-19 vaccine for military members was a federal decision by the Biden administration. And as a member of Congress, Winstead will fight Biden on any burdensome unnecessary COVID-19 restrictions.”

He was a brigadier general.  He’s got Governor Bill Lee’s phone number. Why is he not calling Governor Lee and saying stop these dismissals?

Gulbransen: That’s a really good question. It’s been speculated by a lot of sources involved in the story that he is just too close to the Adjutant General [Jeffrey] Holmes.

Also, I just want to make clear a lot of these candidates, answered the question of the forum, about how they felt about the firings. Beth Harwell and Andy Ogles sent, proactively, a press release addressing the issue.

It’s worth pointing out that the direct question was asked of Winstead if he would call on Governor Lee to do that, given his status, because we wanted to pay special attention – you know, former brigadier general in the Tennessee National Guard. And he refused to answer that particular question.

Leahy: Refused to answer at all. This is a problem with Winstead’s campaign. He’s a generic America-First, but he has no specifics. And in this particular instance, we’re trying to get him in here to talk about the details of this because, not in just this instance, but Crom Carmichael, our original all-star panelist, has been highly critical of his background of donating to Democratic candidates maybe 10 years ago. And then his wife being one of the lead Democratic lobbyists in the state.

This is a big issue, and I think what he’s doing – and we’re friendly with his campaign management team. They did a good job. Chris Delaney, a very strong professional, did a very good job, basically gave us Governor Bill Lee when Diane Black and Randy Boyd were spending $20 million attacking each other. I think they’re trying to do the same thing with General Winstead.

Make America first, and I’m not going to give you any specifics. And in the one area, the one area where he should have a comparative advantage because he is a retired brigadier general in the Tennessee National Guard, where he could do something positive for those 10 percent of the Tennessee National Guard Members who are about to lose their jobs on Thursday, he is doing and saying nothing.

Gulbransen: Right. Exactly. It is interesting to bring up the Democratic donations because I think it underscores …  you look at the Harold Ford donations.

Leahy: So, Winstead made a donation to Harold Ford back in 2006.

Gulbransen: 2006.

Leahy: Democrat nominee for U.S. Senate.

Gulbransen: A couple of congressional races, maybe 2012, but at least one in 2010. He also donated to the Democrat party. We did a story on this. But I think in light of the overturning of Roe v. Wade it’s interesting, he needs to answer the question. What was he thinking at the time? He’s given some generic answers to it.

Leahy: Make America great. I was born on a farm. I married my wife, who is a twin.

Gulbransen: And it doesn’t jibe with his concept that he was a conservative at conception. I’m not sure that any of us have political beliefs when we were conceived.

Leahy: Retired Brigadier General Kurt Winstead, very nice, affable fellow. Very nice. But I have noticed that we’ve attempted in several instances to get specific responses from him. We have not succeeded.

In fact, to be honest, and Chris Devaney is a good friend of ours and is managing his campaign, and we like General Winstead, but he’s avoided us in certain instances when he knows we are going to ask these questions. We need to get him in here and give him a fair opportunity to answer these questions.

Gulbransen: Thus far he has acted like a typical back-slapping politician offering no specifics. As my friends in the military say, you don’t get to go as far as you did without being …

Leahy: Politically savvy.

Listen to the interview:

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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.