As someone who served for 20 years, I’ll tell you that almost no one in my last unit was voting red. Republican politicians use “support our troops” to win votes, but they don’t give a shit about us. Behind the scenes, they’ve been pushing policies to take away our programs and benefits. Democrats are the sole reason we still have any benefits left.
I mentioned in another thread, when the govt shutdown happens, service members don’t get paid until the shutdown ends. But they’re still required to go to work and act like nothing’s happening. And who keeps forcing govt shutdowns as leverage to get their way? Republicans.
As a currently 100% disabled veteran who relies on my VA benefits to survive, I’ll never vote red again.
EDIT: My uncle retired from the US Air Force in the early '90s and they gave him free medical and dental for life as one of his retiree benefits. He applied for VA disability and barely qualified for 10%, which he doesn’t even use.
I retired last summer (July 2022) and I needed to qualify for 100% disability to get the same deal (which is very hard to acquire). Otherwise, they’d only cover whatever long-term ailments I could prove happened during my service and I’d need to pay medical insurance to cover any other medical issues. This was one of the main benefits that encouraged me to join, and Republicans have screwed most people out of it over the past few decades.