Mellor posts his military service records online in response to GOP rival’s attack

Republican congressional candidate Vic Mellor released a small cache of military documents online Thursday to substantiate his service record — a day after his Republican primary rival for Rhode Island’s 2nd Congressional District seat accused him of embellishing his rank.

On Wednesday, Dr. Stephen Skoly’s campaign sent an email blast to followers with questions about Mellor’s military record. Skoly had no doubts that Mellor served in the Marine Corps, but said his campaign had received a set of documents from the National Archives and Records Administration in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. One document identified Mellor’s final rank as corporal. Mellor has previously said he was a sergeant, a more senior rank.

Skoly, 70, an oral surgeon, challenged Mellor to release his service records and other documentation. Mellor’s campaign followed up Wednesday afternoon with a press release accompanied by his military discharge record which lists his final rank as sergeant.

“This baseless attack on my military record demonstrates a disturbing lack of judgment by Dr. Skoly,” Mellor, 56, said in a statement. “It’s very odd behavior, to say the least.”

Records list Mellor’s specialties as military police and military police dog handler. He served in the Marine Corps from Dec. 8, 1987, to Dec. 7, 1995, including active duty from Aug. 18, 1988, to Aug. 17, 1992, according to the federal records shared by Skoly’s team.

On Thursday afternoon, Mellor took to X to post a quartet of documents which appear to further substantiate his service record.

Among the records Mellor dropped Thursday is a Marine Corps appointment certificate naming him “Sergeant (Meritoriously).” The certificate became effective Nov. 2, 1991, which predates Mellor’s August 1992 departure from active duty.

Corroborating this is the DD-214 — a document summarizing a service member’s career upon release or discharge from active duty — that Mellor’s campaign released Wednesday, shortly after Skoly’s email attack. That document lists Mellor’s rank as sergeant and his pay grade as E-5, which is a sergeant.

Mellor also released documents Thursday intended to verify his work supporting presidential security. Skoly had written in his Wednesday email that the records his campaign had received did not appear to substantiate Mellor’s claims about his time on Marine Helicopter Squadron One, or HMX-1, in service of the president.

Mellor’s Thursday records drop, however, included a letter dated Sept. 3, 1991, from an assistant security officer with Marine Helicopter Squadron One, or HMX-1, which lauds then-corporal Mellor for his help with the unit’s “presidential support mission” in Paris and Athens in July that year.

Mellor’s canine companion during the presidential outing had also been scrutinized by his opponent’s campaign, which pointed to a video of Mellor saying during a campaign event, “My dog was so good at it [bomb sniffing] that we became assigned to the President of the United States.”

The records obtained by Skoly’s campaign indicated Mellor had performed “military-working-dog service at the Norfolk complex” in Virginia, but not his presidential support work for HMX-1.

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“Base K9 service is honorable service,” said Skoly’s Wednesday email. “It is not, by itself, an assignment to the President.”

According to the letter Mellor released Thursday, however, the Marine and his four-legged partner conducted bomb searches, with the latter “a vital part of the security mission” that took place in July 1991.

Mellor replied to his post Thursday with two photos of him in uniform — one of him standing amid a group of fellow servicemembers, and a solo portrait in camo fatigues, leash in hand and dog by his side.

Mellor also posted online an April 1990 set of Marine Corps orders directing him to temporary additional duty involving the Fleet Antiterrorism Security Team, or FAST, for a Navy security exercise in Charleston, South Carolina. Skoly had noted Wednesday that FAST was also missing from the assignment history supplied in materials his campaign received from the National Archives.

Neither Skoly nor his campaign could be reached Thursday for additional comment on the new documents released by Mellor.

Mellor campaign manager Patricia Morgan, a former state representative as well congressional candidate herself in 2024, said Thursday she did not know why the National Archives response differed from the records released by Mellor. She floated the idea that the Skoly campaign did not release everything it may have received from the federal government.

“Perhaps the Skoly team just released the ones that was convenient for them,” Morgan said. “They were looking to dig up dirt.”

“It’s really pretty clear he was a sergeant,” Morgan added of Mellor’s service.

Final rank is FOIA eligible

Neither Skoly nor Mellor’s documents have been independently verified. Rhode Island Current has asked the National Personnel Records Center, which is the branch of the National Archives that maintains military service records, for comment and to help explain the discrepancy. As of Thursday afternoon, the agency had said it was working on a response.

A veteran’s “final rank” is listed on the National Archives website as FOIA-eligible information, something which can generally be publicly released as part of an Official Military Personnel File.

A DD-214, meanwhile, is formally known as a “Certificate of Release or Discharge from Active Duty” and, per the National Archives, “contains information normally needed to verify military service for benefits, retirement, employment, and membership in veterans’ organizations.”

The Archives website additionally states that an Official Military Personnel File may include a variety of service forms, including DD-214s, as well as “Service Status/Changes/Revisions.”

The Republican rivals’ dueling documents could form a point of contention during a televised debate scheduled to be taped at WJAR NBC 10’s Cranston station on Friday afternoon. The half-hour debate will air Saturday, Sept. 5, at 5:30 a.m., and Sunday, Sept. 6, at noon.

The winner of the Republican primary will face Democratic U.S. Rep. Seth Magaziner in November for the CD2 seat.