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← Lottery vs. Data-Driven Draft

Who Got Skipped in Vietnam: Deferments, Connections, and the Men Who Went

Evidence rating: CONFIRMED for the classification histories below, as reported from Selective Service records and contemporary reporting. STRONG for this page's lesson: whenever a draft decides who goes by rules and records rather than a blind draw, the people with means and connections find the exits, and the rest go. A data-driven draft makes that sorting faster.

Why this history matters now​

The Vietnam-era draft is the last time Americans were conscripted. About 2.2 million men were drafted over the course of that war (American Experience, PBS). Before the lottery began in December 1969, local boards had wide discretion, and deferments for college, graduate school, marriage, fatherhood, and medical conditions decided who went. The New Yorker, recounting the era, noted that a conscript "couldn't buy his way out of service, as during the Civil War," but "it was still possible for him to avoid the draft by enrolling in college" (The New Yorker, May 6, 2023). President Johnson's commission wanted the order of call "impartially and randomly determined"; President Nixon adopted the lottery. GovFacts describes the 1971 reforms as meant "to eliminate favoritism" (GovFacts, December 5, 2025).

Three men who later held the highest offices show how the classification system worked for those who knew how to use it.

Dick Cheney: five deferments, then too old​

According to a summary of his draft records, Cheney was classified 1-S and 2-S (student and graduate-student deferments) while in college, then 3-A, "deferred due to hardship on dependents," after his marriage and the birth of his first daughter; by January 1967, when he turned 26, "he aged out of draft eligibility altogether. He never served" (@TonySeruga, November 4, 2025). Another account quotes the timing that made the last deferment possible: "On October 26, 1965, the draft was expanded to include married men without children; Cheney's first daughter, Elizabeth, was born 9 months and two days later." It also quotes Cheney's own explanation to the Washington Post's George C. Wilson in 1989: "I had other priorities in the '60s than military service" (@babyboomerMJ, November 1, 2024). The accounts do not claim anything he did was illegal; the deferments were lawful.

Donald Trump: four student deferments, then a medical disqualification​

A summary of his Selective Service classification history, as posted from the records: four 2-S student deferments from 1964 to 1968; reclassified 1-A after graduation; a physical exam in September 1968 marked "DISQ"; reclassified 1-Y, "qualified for service only in time of war or national emergency," on October 15, 1968; and 4-F, "not qualified for military service," in February 1972 (@DittiePE, October 28, 2025). Classification records the agency shared with CNN "confirm that Trump received a student deferment and was later found “disqualified for military service” in 1968 after he underwent a physical exam" (as quoted by @Kathy724335877, August 15, 2026). The medical basis was heel bone spurs. Critics allege the diagnosis came from a podiatrist who rented office space from Trump's father, and his former lawyer Michael Cohen testified to Congress that Trump told him, "You think I'm stupid, I wasn't going to Vietnam" (as summarized by @Jimegolfer1, January 7, 2026). His campaign later said, "When the draft occurred, they never got near his number and he was therefore exempt from serving." His lottery number was 356. The deferments were legal under the rules of the time, and no charge was ever brought.

Joe Biden: five student deferments, then asthma​

Biden received five deferments as a college and law student; after a physical exam on April 5, 1968, he was classified 1-Y "because of asthma as a teenager," according to his campaign spokesman in 2008, meaning he "could be drafted only in time of war or a national emergency" (fact-check text posted by @DavidPica344316, June 2, 2026). The 1-Y classification was abolished in 1971.

The pattern​

A chatbot summary put the pattern in one line: such deferments were "a common practice among elites like Bill Clinton and George W. Bush" (Grok, June 15, 2025). A critic of any draft with exemptions put it more sharply: "Once you have a mandatory draft with exemptions you start getting perverse incentives for those who want to avoid it, and those who do not have the means or connections to do so forced into it" (@g5p8v8r7s7, September 25, 2026). A veteran pointed to South Korea's draft, where "many times the powerful families can get their kids into KATUSA," an easier posting, instead of regular army units (@onlythedeadknow, May 20, 2026).

What changes with a data-driven draft​

In Vietnam, getting a deferment took paperwork, a doctor's note, a student card, a local board that knew your family. It was slow, and slowness gave ordinary families time too. A draft that sorts men by software from federal records moves faster, and it is written by the people who decide the categories. The Center for a New American Security notes that "The president has the authority to prescribe the guidelines for who is drafted" (CNAS report). Whoever writes the rules the software applies decides who is skipped. The families who can influence those rules are not the families whose sons are on the Iran war's front line. See whose children go.

Sources​

Status: Donald Trump, Joe Biden, and Michael Cohen are alive. Dick Cheney: Deceased (2025). Nothing on this page states or implies that any of them broke the law; all deferments described were granted under the rules of the time, and allegations about the medical diagnosis are attributed to those who made them.

Last Updated: 2026-09-26

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