August 6, 2024
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Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris has selected Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, 60, as her vice-presidential running mate.
One republican strategist told CDM, “I have always said - pick someone safe with not a lot of skeletons. Walz is a safe candidate even though Hollywood wanted Shapiro - except for the Floyd demonstrations.”
Democratic Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro is Jewish and if chosen may have pleased Hollywood, but angered the anti-Israel Pro-Hamas demonstrators.
On the surface though, Walz appears an ordinary citizen. He grew up in a small rural town in Nebraska and enlisted in the National Guard at 17 where he served for over two decades.
He taught geography to high school students. He also worked as a football coach, where he helped lead the team to a state championship. He was both a lunchroom supervisor and an adviser to the gay-straight alliance.
He served in the U.S. House of Representatives for six terms before running for governor.
In his 2006 political ad, while running for Congress, Walz emphasized his “everyday” persona.
“Tim Walz is one of those everyday people: Coach to the state champs. Teacher of the year. Command sergeant major, retiring four years late after a tour supporting the war in Afghanistan,” states the ad.
Walz first ran for Congress in 2006, defeating incumbent Rep. Gil Gutknecht (R-Minn.) in the general election.
During his 12 years in Congress, Walz rose to become the top Democrat on the Veterans Affairs Committee and served on the Committee on Agriculture.
During his time in Congress, Governor Walz backed a minimum wage increase and stem cell research, as well as the Obama administration’s nuclear deal with Iran, which may be an issue in the 2024 campaign considering what is on the horizon in the Mideast war.
While other Democrats fiercely defended ObamaCare, Walz acknowledged the “warts” in the health care law with his voters.
The National Rifle Association (NRA) has previously endorsed his congressional campaign and given Walz an “A” rating.
Walz has touted his appreciation for hunting, but in recent years, he has signed major legislation aimed at reducing gun violence.
Walz signed a public safety bill in 2023 that included expanded background checks for gun transfers and the establishment of a “red flag law” in Minnesota, which allows authorities to get court permission to take guns away from individuals deemed a threat to themselves or other parties.
Walz signed a bill in 2024 that included a ban on certain firearm triggers.
“When I first started in Congress I had an A rating from the NRA. I have straight Fs now and you know what? I sleep just fine at night,” Walz said in 2023.
He garnered some name recognition recently coining the phrase “weird” when referring to the Trump Vance republican ticket.
“It’s true, these guys are just weird,” Walz said in a July 23 MSNBC interview. “They’re running for ‘He-Man Women-Haters Club’ or something. That’s what they go at. That’s not what people are interested in.”
“These guys are just weird. That’s what they are. So, it isn’t much else. Don’t give them the power,” Walz said July 28. “Are they a threat to democracy? Yes. Are they going to take our rights away? Yes. … But we’re not afraid of weird people. We’re a little bit creeped out, but we’re not afraid.”
“By picking Tim Walz as her running mate, Kamala Harris not only bent the knee to the radical left, she doubled down on her dangerously liberal, weak, and failed agenda,” a Trump campaign ad published Tuesday stated.
But, Walz does have a major issue that may not help the democratic ticket because he has been highly criticized for not calling in the National Guard until two days after riots erupted in Minnesota after the George Floyd death in May 2020.
Looting, violence and arson erupted in Minneapolis. Two days into the violence, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey asked for Governor Walz to send in the National Guard. The police chief wrote a request asking for 600 troops.
But, it was not until the next afternoon when Walz issued an executive order for the National Guard.
“It looks like Beirut on fire,” said Olivier O’Mahoney to CDM at the time covering the story. O’Mahoney is the U.S. Bureau Chief of Paris Match.
“It was obvious to me that he froze under pressure, under a calamity, as people’s properties were being burned down,” said State Senator Warren Limmer, a Republican who helped lead a committee that investigated the response to the unrest.
“Governor Walz had the ability and duty to use force and law enforcement to stop criminal violence, but he did not,” stated a 2020 Minnesota Senate report on the riots. “Governor Walz was not willing to do what was necessary to stop the rioting right away because he was having a philosophical debate about whether the use of force should be used to stop violence.”
"Lives were lost, over 1,500 businesses and buildings were burned, approximately $500 million in property damage occurred, and community morale was deeply affected," concluded the investigation.
Key Conclusions of the investigation were very harsh on Walz's leadership.
Why would Harris choose a man who froze under pressure?
Could it be that Walz sympathized with the protestors just like Harris stated at the time.
Kamala Harris had already ended her 2020 presidential campaign by December 3, 2019.
By mid-June 2020, Harris stated on late night with Steve Colbert that the demonstrations should not stop.
"They're not gonna stop, and everyone beware, because they're not gonna stop," she added. "They're not gonna stop before Election Day in November, and they're not gonna stop after Election Day."
"Everyone should take note of that, on both levels, that they're not going to let up — and they should not. And we should not," she concluded.
Not since Hubert Humphrey in 1964 and 1968 and Walter Mondale in 1976, 1980, and 1984 has a politician from Minnesota been on a presidential ticket.
Native Minnesotan Humphrey served as vice-president in the Johnson administration and was chosen as the 1968 democratic presidential candidate after a stunning and tragic democratic primary season.
President Lyndon B. Johnson did not run for re-election in 1968. Eugene McCarthy surged with his anti-war position, and Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated on the night of the California primary.
Walter Mondale served as vice-president in the Carter administration. President Jimmy Carter and Mondale lost to Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush in 1980.
And, Walter Mondale, with the support of the AFL-CIO beat out all the other democrats during the 1984 primary season only to lose to Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush in 1984.
KAMALA HARRIS SH TIM WALTZ VP CHOICE
Christine Dolan is a seasoned Investigative Journalist, television producer, author, and photographer. She is Co-Founder of American Conversations whose format focuses on in-depth analysis of critical issues about “the story behind the headlines.”
