Who is Tim Walz? Army veteran and teacher compared to Bernie Sanders
The profile of the folksy Minnesota governor nicknamed ‘Midwestern dad’ surged after a viral cable news interview in which he called Donald Trump and JD Vance ‘just weird’.
He was the unassuming governor of Minnesota whose straight-talking, folksy charm earned him the nickname “Midwestern dad”.
But Tim Walz’s profile has surged after a viral cable news interview in which he called Donald Trump and his running-mate, JD Vance, “just weird”.
The phrase caught on, appearing to get under the skin of Republicans and giving Democrats one of their most effective attack lines in years.
Before picking Walz, the Harris team is said to have been struck by his appeal to both working-class and progressive voters.
Walz, 60, grew up in small-town Nebraska. When he turned 17 he enlisted in the Army National Guard, and during his 24 years in service he worked mostly in disaster response, never seeing combat. After 9/11 he was deployed to Europe to support Operation Enduring Freedom.
Walz married Gwen Whipple, a teacher, in 1994 and the couple had two children. They moved to Mankato, Minnesota, where they both worked at a local high school. While teaching geography, Walz served as the football coach, taking the team to its first state championship in 1999.
He volunteered for John Kerry’s 2004 presidential campaign, which appointed him district co-ordinator of Vets for Kerry, and ran for office in 2006 in a Republican-leaning congressional district, beating the incumbent. Walz kept the district until 2016, then ran for governor in 2018 on the theme of “One Minnesota”. He won by 11 points.
In summing up his broad appeal, Jim McGovern of Massachusetts described Walz as “down to earth - he’s the real deal”. He added: “There’s nothing phony about him, and he calbernls ‘em as he sees ‘em, and he tells it like it is, and I appreciate the candour.”
As governor, Walz was in office when George Floyd was murdered by Minneapolis police in May 2020, a killing that prompted riots across America. Republicans criticised Walz for his response to the sometimes violent unrest. He had focused on police reform, signing legislation restricting the use of chokeholds and introducing de-escalation training.
Harris has sided with a low-key partner who was among the most liberal of the vice-presidential contenders. Walz has introduced progressive policies, including paid family leave, universal school breakfasts, recreational cannabis legalisation, abortion access and curbs on gun ownership.
“The golden rule that makes small towns work so we’re not at each others’ throats all the time in a little town is: Mind your own damn business,” Walz said of opposition to his stance of reproductive rights.
He used to be a gun owner and received endorsements and donations from the National Rifle Association, but backed an assault weapons ban after the 2018 school shooting in Parkland, Florida.
Last year, he signed into law a child tax credit plan for Minnesota, one of the most generous state plans in the country.
Walz has often served as a Biden-Harris surrogate, and has made frequent appearances on national television.
Earlier in the week, he riffed on Vance’s 2021 comments calling Democrats “a bunch of childless cat ladies”.
“Go ahead and continue to denigrate people,” Walz told MSNBC. “Good luck with that. Turn on the internet and see what cat people do when you go after ‘em.”
White-haired, bespectacled Walz, who is only six months older than Harris, has earned comparisons with Bernie Sanders, the liberal Vermont senator and former presidential hopeful. Like Sanders, he has already begun to co-opt a following among young voters.
Walz’s newest supporters have turned him into viral meme content, declaring he gives off “favourite uncle” energy. David Hogg, a prominent young gun-control activist who survived the Parkland shooting, shared a video of Walz on MSNBC in which the governor summed up the Democratic strategy in eight words: “These are weird people on the other side.”
“He’s been an extremely productive governor, he’s a total Midwestern dad, he’s hilarious and genuine,” Hogg wrote.
The Times
