Purple Heart Vet Teddy Daniels Just Shredded a Democrat US Senate Candidate for His Ugly Reddit Post

Teddy Daniels took four Taliban bullets so his men wouldn't have to.

Graham Platner watched the helmet-cam video and wrote that Daniels didn't deserve to live.

When Fox News asked Platner to apologize this weekend, he looked into the camera and refused.

Platner Refused to Apologize and Teddy Daniels Had an Answer

In June 2019, Platner logged onto Reddit as "P-Hustle" – his own acknowledged account – and reacted to a viral helmet-cam video of Daniels taking fire from Taliban fighters in Afghanistan in 2012.

Daniels was shot four times.

Platner called him a "dumb motherf—er" and wrote that "poor marksmanship on the Taliban's part" was the only reason Daniels survived.

He deleted it. The Maine Monitor's database kept it anyway.

When Fox News found Platner near his home Saturday and asked for an apology, he responded: "Do you know how many of my friends have Purple Hearts?"

Daniels had a simple answer to that.

"I consider the source," he told Fox News Digital. "In order for me to worry about what you say, first I have to respect you."

"There's zero-to-no respect for a self-proclaimed communist."

He went further: "Some guys run towards gunfire and other guys run toward keyboards – and I think that's a big difference."

Platner has tried to explain his trail of deleted posts by citing his PTSD diagnosis from multiple combat deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Daniels – who has his own diagnosis and his own 20-plus surgeries to prove it – wasn't buying it.

"This appears to be a continuing course of conduct with Graham Platner," Daniels said. "He is trying to blame PTSD as a crutch to avoid accountability. The first step of being a man is taking responsibility for your actions – and we're just not seeing that here."

Platner Called the PTSD Excuse Bull in His Own Deleted Posts

In 2020, five years before launching his Senate campaign, Platner posted on a socialist Reddit forum about a Marine veteran cop who killed porcupines with a baton and cited PTSD as the reason.

Platner was not sympathetic.

"Don't buy into that bull——," he wrote. "I did 4 tours in the infantry to Iraq and Afghanistan, saw all kinds of awful things, have a PTSD diagnosis and STILL manage not to beat defenseless animals to death for fun. That's just giving excuses for garbage behavior."

His words. His rules. His account.

The Navy SEAL who killed Usama bin Laden, Robert O'Neill, called Platner's post about Daniels "completely barbaric." "Every single time you fight, it's for the man next to you," O'Neill said. "Politics goes out the window."

Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries both went silent when reporters asked about Platner this week.

Elizabeth Warren – who endorsed him – told cameras voters should judge "who Graham Platner is today."

The problem is Platner already told voters who he is. He just thought he'd deleted it.

Platner Came After Chris Kyle Too

Platner also went after Chris Kyle – American Sniper, the most decorated sniper in U.S. military history – suggesting in an unearthed interview that Kyle killed civilians to inflate his numbers.

Daniels didn't hesitate: "This was premeditated. There was no trigger. Chris Kyle was a man 100 times greater than Graham Platner and shoes he could never, ever fill."

He said if anyone deserves an apology, it's Kyle's widow and children – to their faces.

The full picture of Platner's deleted Reddit trail is staggering. He wrote that the U.S. Army was "full of fat, lazy trash." He praised Hamas military tactics. He called himself a communist and a socialist. He racked up over 100 posts to socialist subreddits. He used homophobic slurs. He dismissed rape allegations in the military. He deleted all of it before announcing his campaign.

Democrats made this man their Senate nominee to unseat Susan Collins.

John Fetterman – not exactly a right-wing bomb-thrower – called Platner an "avowed communist."

Teddy Daniels earned his Purple Heart with four bullets in his body.

Graham Platner earned his Senate nomination with a delete button.

Sources:

• Andrew Mark Miller, "Purple Heart veteran unloads on Platner after Dem. Sen. candidate refuses to apologize," Fox News, May 27, 2026.
• "Platner called PTSD excuse 'bull——' in 2020 post, now cites his own struggle to explain online controversies," Fox News Digital, May 2026.
• "Watch: Platner doesn't apologize to Purple Heart recipient, voters when confronted on post mocking soldier," Fox News Digital, May 2026.
• "Top Democrats decline to address Graham Platner's resurfaced vulgar Reddit posts amid Maine Senate race scrutiny," Hannity.com, May 2026.
• "Purple Heart Veteran Ted Daniels Blasts Maine Senate Candidate Graham Platner," Hannity.com, May 2026.