WASHINGTON (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris on Tuesday named Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate, choosing a likable, longtime politician who Democrats hope can maintain the party’s newfound unity as the campaign heads toward Election Day.
Harris said in a social media post that Walz has “made a difference for working families” as a governor, coach, teacher and veteran. Walz called it “the honor of a lifetime” to be Harris’s vice presidential nominee. The two will appear together at an evening rally in Philadelphia.
By choosing Walz, 60, she is turning to a Midwestern governor, a war veteran and union supporter who helped push through an ambitious Democratic program for his state that includes comprehensive protections for abortion rights and generous support for families.
“It’s great to have him on the team,” Harris wrote on X. “Now let’s get to work.”
He joins Harris during one of the most turbulent periods in current American politics, promising an unpredictable campaign. Republicans rallied around former President Donald Trump after the assassination attempt in July. Just weeks later, President Joe Biden ended his re-election campaign, forcing Harris to unite Democrats and consider potential running mate candidates over a breathtaking two-week period.
Harris hopes to strengthen her campaign’s position in the Midwest, a key region in presidential politics that often serves as a buffer for Democrats seeking the White House. The party is still hurting from Trump’s victories in Michigan and Wisconsin in 2016. Trump lost those states in 2020 but has them in his sights as he seeks re-election this year and expands his focus to Minnesota.
Harris, Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff and Walz are expected to appear together at an evening rally in Philadelphia, commemorating a joint appearance by Biden and Harris in 2020 in Wilmington, Delaware.
After traveling to Pennsylvania on Tuesday, they will spend the next five days flying thousands of miles across the country, visiting crucial swing states. On Wednesday, they will visit Eau Claire, Wisconsin and Detroit, and later in the week, Phoenix and Las Vegas.
Planned stops in Savannah, Georgia and Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina, have been postponed due to the impact of Tropical Storm Debby.
A team of lawyers and political operatives led by former Attorney General Eric Holder reviewed documents and conducted interviews with the potential candidates, and Harris herself met with her three finalists on Sunday. She discussed the decision with her top aides at the vice president’s residence in Washington on Monday and made it final on Tuesday morning, the informants said.
Harris, the first Black woman and person of South Asian descent to lead a major party’s ticket, initially considered nearly a dozen candidates before narrowing her efforts to a handful of earnest contenders, all of whom were white men. In Walz, she chose a low-key partner who has proven to be a champion of Democratic causes.
“It’s no surprise that San Francisco liberal Kamala Harris wants West Coast wannabe Tim Walz as her running mate – Walz has spent his time in office remaking Minnesota in the image of the Golden State,” said Karoline Leavitt, Trump’s campaign press secretary. “Walz is obsessed with spreading California’s dangerously liberal agenda far and wide.”
Walz was a mighty public advocate in Harris’ campaign against Trump and Senator JD Vance of Ohio, calling Republicans “just weird” in an interview last month. Democrats have seized on that message and have been amplified since then.
During a fundraiser for Harris in Minneapolis on Monday, Walz said, “Calling these guys weird wasn’t an insult. It was an observation.”
Walz, who grew up in the compact town of West Point, Nebraska, was a social studies teacher, football coach and union member at Mankato West High School in Minnesota before entering politics.
He won the first of six terms in Congress in 2006 from a predominantly rural district in southern Minnesota and used his office to champion veterans’ issues. Walz served 24 years in the Army National Guard and rose to the rank of Command Sergeant Major, one of the highest ranks in the military.
He ran for governor in 2018 under the slogan “One Minnesota” and won by more than 11 points.
As governor, Walz had to find ways to navigate a legislature split between a Democratic-controlled House and a Republican-led Senate in his first term. But Minnesota has a history of divided government, and that arrangement was surprisingly productive in his first year. But the COVID-19 pandemic hit Minnesota early in his second year in office, and bipartisan cooperation soon faltered.
Walz relied on emergency powers to direct the state’s response. Republicans, fed up with restrictions like lockdowns, school closures and business shutdowns, retaliated by firing or ousting some of his agency heads. But Minnesotans stuck at home also got to know Walz better through his habitual afternoon briefings in the early days of the crisis, which were broadcast and streamed nationwide.
Walz won re-election in 2022 by nearly 8 percentage points over his Republican challenger, Dr. Scott Jensen, a physician and vaccine skeptic. Democrats also retained control of the House and won the Senate, achieving the “trifecta” of full control of both chambers and the governorship for the first time in eight years. A key reason for this was the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, which found that the Constitution does not include a right to abortion. This has hurt Republicans in Minnesota, especially among suburban women.
“Tim was in the news because the country and the world saw the man we love so much,” U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar said Monday.
Ken Martin, chairman of the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party, said the teenage people he spoke to during the campaign were “overwhelmed by Walz pills.”
Walz and other Democrats entered the 2023 legislative session with an ambitious agenda—and a whopping $17.6 billion budget surplus to facilitate pay for it. Among their biggest accomplishments was sweeping abortion rights protections that included eliminating nearly all of the restrictions Republicans had enacted in previous years, including a 24-hour waiting period and the requirement for parental consent. They also enacted fresh protections for transgender rights, making the state a haven for families coming from other states to seek treatment for transgender children.
Their other major accomplishments included tax breaks for families with children that would dramatically reduce child poverty, and free school breakfasts and lunches for all students regardless of family income. They also introduced a paid family and medical leave program, legalized marijuana for recreational utilize for adults, and made it easier to vote.
Republicans complained that Walz and his Democrats had squandered a surplus that would have been better spent on lasting tax relief for all. And they criticized the governor and his administration for lax oversight of pandemic programs that cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars.
Federal prosecutors have charged 70 people with defrauding state food programs that funded meals for children out of $250 million during the pandemic under Walz’s watch. The scandal, known as the Feeding Our Future scandal, is one of the largest pandemic aid fraud cases in the country. The Office of the Legislative Auditor, a bipartisan watchdog, issued a scathing report in June saying Walz’s education department “failed to respond to warning signs,” did not exercise its authority effectively and was ill-prepared to respond.
Republicans continue to criticize Walz for his response to the sometimes violent unrest following the killing of George Floyd by a police officer in Minneapolis in 2020, which also included the setting of fire at a police station.
During a fundraiser in St. Paul in May, Trump repeated his false claim that he was responsible for deploying the National Guard to quell the violence. “The whole city burned down. … If I hadn’t been president, Minneapolis wouldn’t be here today,” Trump said.
In fact, it was Walz who gave the order, which he issued in response to requests from the mayors of Minneapolis and St. Paul. But within Minnesota, Republican lawmakers said both Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey were too ponderous to respond. And Frey and Walz pointed fingers at each other about who was responsible for not activating the National Guard more quickly.
Walz has often served as a Biden-Harris surrogate and has made increasing appearances on national television, including an interview on Fox News that so angered Trump that he posted on Truth Social: “You’re forcing me to fight battles I shouldn’t be fighting.” Walz is also co-chair of the Rules Committee for the Democratic National Convention. And he co-chaired a meeting of Democratic governors at the White House with Biden after the president’s disastrous performance in the debate with Trump.
Walz’s nomination could facilitate Democrats hold on to the state’s 10 electoral votes and strengthen the party more broadly in the Midwest. No Republican has won a statewide election in Minnesota since Tim Pawlenty was re-elected governor in 2006, but Republican candidates for attorney general and state auditor came close in 2022.
In 2016, Trump trailed Democrat Hillary Clinton in the state by just 1.5 percentage points. While Biden won Minnesota by more than 7 percentage points in 2020, Trump now falsely claims he won the state last time and can do so again.
Minnesota has produced two vice presidents, Hubert Humphrey and Walter Mondale.
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Karnowski reported from Minneapolis. Associated Press writer Michael Balsamo contributed to this report from Washington.
