Army lieutenant who called Joint Chiefs memo ‘seditious’ probably about to get a class on the UCMJ

An Army National Guard officer who described a recent letter by the Joint Chiefs sent military-wide as “seditious” is probably about to get a class on the military justice system.

1st Lt. Chris Boyd, a chaplain candidate with the Ohio National Guard, recently posted on Facebook that a Jan. 12 memo from the nation’s top generals which condemned the attack on the Capitol and urged service members to defend the Constitution was “deceptively seditious,” according to screenshots provided by the Military Religious Freedom Foundation.

In their letter, Army Gen. Mark Milley and others on the Joint Chiefs of Staff decried the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol as a “violent riot” that was “a direct assault” on lawmakers and the constitutional process that was “inconsistent with the rule of law.” They noted that Joe Biden would be the military’s next commander-in-chief since his electoral victory was confirmed by the states and courts.

“They are either scared or in bed with the left,” Boyd wrote of the letter on Facebook. “Both are bad because that would go against the values held dear by the military such as, in this case, personal courage and integrity,” he added, which, needless to say, is an ill-advised statement to say of people with stars on their collar.

Military officers are not allowed to use contemptuous words against government officials or superior commissioned officers, according to the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

In a letter sent on Friday to Maj. Gen. John Harris, the adjutant general of Ohio, MRFF urged officials to investigate the posts, which were flagged to the advocacy group by an active-duty Army captain. The group included other controversial posts written by Boyd, including claims that “worthless” masks were meant to condition people to accept totalitarianism and Democrats were “the real insurrectionists” behind the Jan. 6 Capitol riots, when hundreds of pro-Trump demonstrators breached the Capitol in an attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

Ohio National Guard officials did not respond to a request for comment from Task & Purpose.

Boyd is not the only soldier to come under scrutiny for social media posts in recent days. Army officials said last week they were investigating a chaplain with the 3rd Security Forces Assistance Brigade who said in a Facebook post that transgender service members were “mentally unfit” to serve in the military.

Meanwhile, two Michigan National Guard soldiers were disciplined last year after posting a “message to liberals” on TikTok. Then their battalion commander came under suspicion for his own posts in which he shared conspiracy theories and personal political views. And two other soldiers were investigated after they appeared in a video shown during the Democratic National Convention. Pentagon rules forbid service members from taking part in most partisan political activities.

Correction: This article was updated to note Boyd is a chaplain candidate and not yet a chaplain.