29 August 2024
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz is facing fresh scrutiny on his background and political record since becoming Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate on the Democratic presidential ticket.
Many of the criticisms that have come since he entered the national political stage are familiar topics for Minnesotans, such as his handling of riots following the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
Other criticisms have come up before, too. While Walz campaigned for his former southern Minnesota Congressional seat in 2006, his 1995 drunken driving arrest and details of his military record were called into question.
But as was the case in his 12-year stint in Congress, and as governor, Walz so far has appeared to brush many of the attacks on his record and background aside.
While negative characterizations and memes of Walz percolate among the political right, so far they don’t appear to be sticking with the general public.
A recent poll by the Associated Press and National Opinion Research Center shows he continues to enjoy positive public perception, with 36% viewing him positively and 25% viewing him negatively, versus Donald Trump running mate Ohio Sen. JD Vance’s 27% favorable to 44% unfavorable rating.
Here’s some of the main issues:
In vitro fertilization
Earlier this month, Walz had to clarify that he and his wife Gwen did not use in vitro fertilization to conceive their children after years of struggling with infertility.
Walz had used his family’s struggles in campaign messaging after the Alabama Supreme Court earlier this year issued a ruling restricting IVF — where egg cells are extracted from the ovaries and artificially fertilized with sperm outside the body before being reintroduced into the uterus.
“What those judges did was a direct attack on my family,” Walz said in his March State of the State address. “Gwen and I will not forget it. We will not forgive it. And neither will thousands of other moms and dads across this state.”
Walz used the Alabama decision as fodder for campaign fundraising emails, and more recently used the issue to attack Donald Trump’s running mate JD Vance.
“If it was up to him, I wouldn’t have a family because of IVF,” he said earlier this month.
But it turns out his family did not use IVF to conceive. Gwen Walz recently noted that the family actually used intrauterine insemination, a procedure where sperm are artificially introduced into the uterus to fertilize an egg. The procedure is less invasive than IVF, and conception takes place within a woman’s body rather than in a laboratory setting.
Military record
Walz served in the National Guard for 24 years, and some of his claims and other details he has shared about his time in the military are under scrutiny.
In a 2018 video recently shared by the Harris campaign, Walz called for stricter gun control policies, saying he wanted to keep “weapons of war that I carried in war” out of civilian hands. Many pointed out Walz had never served in combat while he was in the Guard. A campaign spokesperson told the Associated Press that he had misspoken.
“Governor Walz would never insult or undermine any American’s service to this country — in fact, he thanks Senator Vance for putting his life on the line for our country. It’s the American way,” spokesperson Lauren Hitt said in a statement to the AP.
Others have claimed Walz dodged an overseas deployment before his entry into politics. Shortly before he ran for Congress in 2006, Walz retired from the National Guard. The timing of his decision attracted scrutiny, as his Minnesota National Guard unit, the 1st Battalion, 125th Field Artillery, deployed two months after his retirement.
Official notification of the deployment did not come until July 2005 — two months after Walz retired, according to the Minnesota National Guard. He had been eligible for retirement since 2002, though there were already rumors well before his unit’s deployment that they might be sent overseas.
Walz also has come under scrutiny for the rank he claimed to have upon retiring from the National Guard in 2005 — command sergeant major.
While Walz received a promotion to that rank, he left the military before completing the required training in order to officially obtain the rank. In reality, he retired as a master sergeant.
Drunken driving arrest
Walz was arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol in Nebraska in 1995 after being pulled over for driving 96 mph in a 55 mph zone. But his arrest and guilty plea to a lesser charge of reckless driving have come up in past campaigns.
Walz faced criticism for the drinking and driving incident while he ran for Congress in 2006. During his campaign, his staff spread misleading information about the circumstances to news outlets that covered the arrest, the Associated Press reported.
His campaign claimed Walz was not drunk, could not hear orders from a state trooper and had balance issues from hearing loss related to his service in a National Guard Artillery unit, according to a report in the Rochester Post-Bulletin cited by the AP.
It turned out these claims were not true. Walz ultimately pleaded guilty to a charge of reckless driving and says he hasn’t drank alcohol since.
2020 riots
Trump and others have accused Walz of taking too long to stop riots in the Twin Cities after Minneapolis police killed George Floyd.
For several days in 2020, demonstrators protesting Floyd’s death marched in Minneapolis, and public anger eventually spiraled into widespread looting and arson. Republicans, such as JD Vance, say Walz allowed the city to burn.
Walz activated the National Guard in response to the riots on May 28, just a day into unrest, though at the time Guard leaders said they did not immediately get clear direction on what they were supposed to do from civilian authorities.
At the time, Minnesota National Guard adjutant general Maj. Gen. Jon Jensen, suggested Minneapolis city leadership didn’t give them clear directions on where they needed soldiers. Troops weren’t on the ground until well after the Third Police Precinct in Minneapolis had been burned by rioters.
A review by an independent agency commissioned by the Minnesota Department of Public Safety found the state and city of Minneapolis didn’t establish clear leadership early on as rioters burned and looted businesses. It also found there was a lack in communication between various government agencies that “ led community groups and individuals to take matters into their own hands.”
It also can be noted that in June of 2020 then-President Trump called Minnesota a “laughingstock” due to riot response but did signal support of Walz’s own actions during a meeting with governors.
“I fully agree with the way he handled it the last couple of days,” Trump said in a recording of the teleconference that was posted by The New York Times. “I asked him to do that. … You have to dominate.”
China ties
Republicans have been pushing to make Walz’s trips to China into a campaign issue by raising questions about his ties to the country and its ruling Communist Party.
On Aug. 16, House Republicans announced an investigation into Walz’s past in China, which included a year-long stint teaching there in the 1989-1990 school year, a honeymoon trip with Gwen Walz in 1994, and student trips he organized in the late 1990s and early 2000s. He’s visited the country 30 times, according to multiple reports.
House Republicans in announcing their probe said they wanted to investigate what they called Walz’s “longstanding connections to Chinese Communist Party.”
During his time in Congress, Walz served on a Congressional committee tracking human rights issues in China and has met with the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of China-occupied Tibet.
Governing record/Feeding Our Future fraud case
On the campaign trail, Walz has touted his achievements as governor, like approving universal school meals, creating a paid family and medical leave plan and codifying abortion rights protections in state law.
Critics have pointed to those legislative accomplishments, as well as a vast increase in government spending during the 2023 legislative session that ate most of a historic $17.5 billion surplus, as well as the creation of new taxes and new entitlement programs, as a sign of Walz lying too far on the political left to be suitable as a national leader.
A less discussed issue on the presidential campaign trail is the vast waste and fraud that happened under the Walz administration. Five Minnesotans were convicted in federal court in June for their roles in a scheme to steal millions in pandemic relief funds. Two defendants in that case were acquitted.
A total of 70 people have been indicted in the case. Those responsible for the fraud spent the money on homes, trips, jewelry and luxury cars, according to prosecutors.
A legislative audit in June found “inadequate oversight” by the Minnesota Department of Education created an opportunity for more than $250 million in fraud. The report said state officials failed to act on warning signs of fraud.
“MDE’s responsibilities under federal law ranged from providing guidance and training to Feeding Our Future staff, to terminating the organization’s participation in the programs if warranted,” said Legislative Auditor Judy Randall and Special Reviews Director Katherine Theisen in a letter attached to the report. “We believe MDE’s actions and inactions created opportunities for fraud.”
No state employees have been disciplined for their actions or failure to act in the fraud case.
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