Blunt said he had not hidden the deferments. "Anytime anybody ever asked me about that, I would have said I had student deferments," he said. But Blunt's office did not disclose the deferments in 2015, when The Star directly asked if he had ever received one.
"Senator Blunt was 1A status in 1969, the year of the first draft lottery," the office had replied. "His number was in the low 300s and was never called."
Federal draft records show Blunt's draft status in 1969 wasn't 1-A, or eligible for service. Instead, he was classified as 2-S, which is a student deferment. That deferment, not a high lottery number, protected Blunt from the draft in 1969.
Blunt's staff said this week that poor memories and difficult-to-obtain draft records may have contributed to the confusion.
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The above quotations are from Fact-checking on 2016 presidential, gubernatorial, and Senate campaigns.
Click here for other excerpts from Fact-checking on 2016 presidential, gubernatorial, and Senate campaigns. Click here for other excerpts by Roy Blunt. Click here for a profile of Roy Blunt.
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