America’s Politics Are Changing: How Tim Walz VP Pick Highlights Support for His Progressive Stances

AMY GOODMAN: Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris campaigned in Philadelphia Tuesday with Tim Walz just hours after Harris picked the Minnesota governor to be her running mate. Walz was elected governor of Minnesota in 2018 after six terms in Congress, where he served as the ranking member of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee. Walz is a former public school teacher and high school football coach who served 24 years in the National Guard. Harris and Walz spoke Tuesday in front of more than 12,000 people at Temple University, where Walz criticized his Republican rivals Donald Trump and JD Vance.

GOV. TIM WALZ: Like all regular people I grew up with in the heartland, JD studied at Yale, had his career funded by Silicon Valley billionaires, and then wrote a best-seller trashing that community. Come on! That’s not what Middle America is. And I’ve got to tell you, I can’t wait to debate the guy — that is, if he’s willing to get off the couch and show up, so… You see what I did there. Look, I’ve got to tell you, pointing out just an observation of mine that I made. I just have to say it. You know it, you feel it. These guys are creepy and, yes, just weird as hell. That’s what you see. …

Again and again and again, Trump weakens our economy to strengthen his own hand. He mocks our laws. He sows chaos and division. And that’s to say nothing of his record as president. He froze in the face of the COVID crisis. He drove our economy into the ground. And make no mistake: Violent crime was up under Donald Trump. That’s not even counting the crimes he committed.

AMY GOODMAN: Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, speaking as Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris’s new running mate at their first campaign appearance together Tuesday evening in Philadelphia.

Minnesota’s progressive Congressmember Ilhan Omar celebrated Walz’s selection on Tuesday, writing on X, quote, “Congratulations to our next Vice President @Tim_Walz. Our North Star state Governor has signed universal school meals, paid family and sick leave, marijuana legalization, and protections for reproductive rights into law. Bringing Minnesota nice to the ticket,” she said.

A video from last year has gone viral of Walz signing into law a measure guaranteeing free breakfast and lunch for all the state’s public school students. The students embrace Walz and cheer him as he signs.

GOV. TIM WALZ: It is now law!

AMY GOODMAN: Meanwhile, Tara Houska, an Indigenous lawyer, activist and founder of the Giniw Collective, recalled on social media it was Walz who oversaw the 2021 police response to the Stop Line 3 protest, where she was, quote, “shot by police with rubber bullets, mace, pepper balls paid for by Enbridge.” She said, “I heard shouts, cries and gasping coughing punctuated by the sound of munitions firing and a huge drill out of a sci-fi movie boring thru the river we were there to protect,” unquote. A Minnesota judge later dismissed the charges against Line 3 pipeline protesters in the name of climate justice, saying, quote, “To criminalize their behavior would be the crime,” unquote.

We begin today’s show looking at Walz’s political record. As governor, Republicans attacked him for waiting too long to deploy the Minnesota National Guard on the protests after the police murder of George Floyd in 2020. Now Donald Trump and JD Vance are highlighting how Walz signed into state law access to abortion rights after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

Soon we’ll speak with Asma Mohammed, co-chair of the Minnesota “uncommitted” delegation, about where Tim Walz stands on Israel-Gaza and pro-Palestinian protests, which reportedly may have helped to shape why he was chosen over Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro. But we begin with Branko Marcetic, Jacobin staff writer. His new piece there is headlined “The Tim Walz VP Pick Shows America’s Politics Are Changing.”

Branko, welcome back to Democracy Now! Why don’t you lay out for us who Tim Walz is, the teacher turned coach turned congressmember, governor and now VP candidate?

BRANKO MARCETIC: Well, Walz is, in many ways, an unlikely progressive populist. He started out as kind of a somewhat conservative member of Congress. He ran for this Republican seat, very rural, deep-red Republican seat. He won it in 2006 in the wave election of that year. He was actually one of the few military, former military members that had been recruited that year by Democrats to try and win seats that actually succeeded. And he kind of then probably held on to the seat over the years, you know, through several different wave elections that went against Democrats.

And he had this somewhat contradictory record. He took conservative positions on things like vetting of refugees and gun rights. He was favored by the NRA for a very long time. But he also voted against the top bailout. He was very antiwar. He had a very decent antiwar record. And right up to his time as governor, he very much pushed back against this idea that China is this adversary, that the U.S. cannot have a cooperative relationship with it.

And then, once he won in 2018, he had run on kind of a somewhat tepid left-of-center program. But as governor, he really, I think — I think, looking at what had happened in the political landscape after 2016, the way that things had shifted, the way that progressive policies, investment in human infrastructure had become such a popular thing, he really kind of took that program as his own, and he ran on raising taxes on the rich. He ran on and actually implemented policy to transition to renewable energy by first 2050, then he moved that timeline up to 2040. He ran on investing in education and child care, which in Minnesota was the most expensive in the country often.

And then, in 2023, when he finally got this Democratic trifecta, this Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party trifecta in Minnesota, meaning that the Democrats basically controlled the state Senate, the state House and the Governor’s Mansion, he ended up just, you know, going full speed ahead and saying, “Look, we only have one chance to try and get all this done.” And that’s where you see the flurry of legislation that — some of which you mentioned there — get passed, in addition to which you would also list things like tuition-free public college for families making under $80,000 a year, banning noncompete clauses for workers, legalizing marijuana, of course, the renewable energy transition bill, and things like banning conversion therapy — a whole host of things — capping payday lenders. It was really one of the most consequential and productive legislative sessions anywhere in the country. And again, it’s quite a surprising one, given Walz’s background as someone who did not come out of necessarily progressive politics.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Branko, could you talk a bit about what he did in terms of the wage theft law and reforms to solitary confinement in the state and a little more about what he did in terms of climate change?

BRANKO MARCETIC: Yeah. I mean, the wage theft law, that was actually something that he had done much earlier, in his first term as governor, before he had that trifecta.

So, one of the interesting things about Walz is that he’s someone who, like many Democrats, talks about bipartisanship, consensus, compromise. These are all things that we are used to hearing from Democratic officials. Usually what that means in practice is it’s making deals that end up giving a lot of victories to the right, ends up kind of disappointing the Democratic base. And what ends up happening is that the people who make the deals then have to sort of put a gun to the head of the Democratic voters and say, “Well, look, you have no option but to vote for us anyway.”

In Walz’s case, he was actually able to work with Republicans — not on everything, certainly. A lot of his agenda was blocked when they controlled the state Senate. But he did actually manage to get quite a few things passed with Republican support, including this wage theft bill, which was then considered one of the strongest in the country. It made stealing wages more than a thousand dollars a felony.

On climate, as I said, there was a 2040 renewable transition bill. That’s a major thing. However, at the same time, we have to note that there were limitations to some of his progressivism on this. The Line 3 pipeline by Enbridge, which you referenced, Amy, that was one of the things that Walz — at first he had sided with environmentalists and moved to suspend it, but in the end he went ahead with it. And that’s considered a big red flag for environmentalists, because as good as it is to set targets for transitioning to renewables, by allowing these pipelines to be built, it locks in potentially decades of carbon emissions and, of course, also serves as a ticking time bomb, where these pipelines inevitably end up having leaks or some kind of problem, and they end up poisoning the water and land around them.

In terms of criminal justice, again, he would probably be considered to have a mixed record. The right will attack him for a number of different reforms he made in criminal justice. As you say, he banned solitary confinement in juvenile facilities. He also, at first, did things like banning certain types of holds by police in schools. He also was very vocally in favor of prosecuting the killers of George Floyd. And he made a number of other reforms, banning warrior training by police and other sort of dangerous trainings there. But at the same time, once some of the energy from 2020 on the streets had kind of gone away and public mood became more concerned with crime, with public safety, that kind of thing, then at that point Walz kind of did what a lot of Democrats did and became much more of an ardent champion of law enforcement. He still signed certain reforms into law — don’t get me wrong — but in the end, he put much more of a focus on putting money into police departments, putting more money into police recruitment. He opposed the Minneapolis ballot measure that would have replaced that city’s police department with a public safety department. So, you know — and, actually, I mentioned the banning the certain holds in schools. Walz actually ended up folding on that under police pressure, and he ended up actually changing that and repealing it, ultimately.

So, you know, there’s a mixed record there. I think there’s things that both his critics on the right are going to find things to attack him on and as well as critics on the left. And I think also critics on the — people on the left, progressives, they’ll find things that they like about his record on criminal justice, too.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to go to an old radio ad for Walz’s campaign for Congress back in 2006 that touches on the issue of healthcare.

TIM WALZ: Hi. My name is Tim Walz, and I’m running for Congress here in southern Minnesota for several important reasons, but today I’d like to tell you about one issue that’s very personal to me. I am a retired command sergeant major in the Minnesota National Guard. And after years of firing artillery, I sustained severe inner ear damage. Because I have good health insurance provided through my employer, I was able to have surgery on my ear. As my ear healed, my hearing was gradually restored. One morning several weeks after the surgery, I woke to a sound I couldn’t identify. I asked my wife what I was hearing, and she told me, “Tim, that’s your 4-year-old daughter Hope.” You see, Hope wakes up singing every morning, but I had never heard that sound until that day. I’m running for Congress because I believe we, as a country, have a moral obligation to ensure that every father can hear his daughter sing, that every citizen receives the best care our medical community has to offer. I’m Tim Walz, and I approved this message because I have heard how important healthcare is to everyone.

AMY GOODMAN: And this is Tim Walz speaking last night.

GOV. TIM WALZ: In Minnesota, we respect our neighbors and their personal choices that they make. Even if we wouldn’t make the same choice for ourselves, there’s a golden rule: Mind your own damn business. These guys are after my heart, chanting “Mind your own damn business.” That feels good, so thank you. Look, that includes IVF. And this gets personal for me and my family. When my wife and I decided to have children, we spent years going through infertility treatments. And I remember praying every night for a call for good news, the pit in my stomach when the phone rang, and the agony when we heard that the treatments hadn’t worked. So it wasn’t by chance that when we welcomed our daughter into the world, we named her Hope. When vice president and I talk about freedom, we mean the freedom to make your own healthcare decisions.

AMY GOODMAN: Tim Walz has zeroed in on JD Vance’s previous opposition to a Senate bill that sought to protect access to IVF. Branko Marcetic, it bring in several issues. It brings in the issue of abortion, and it brings in the issue of healthcare. He said a Trump-Vance administration would surely overturn the Affordable Care Act.

BRANKO MARCETIC: Yeah. I mean, I think, number one, those clips speak to his strengths as a communicator. And the issue of abortion has obviously become central to American politics since the overturning of Roe v. Wade. It’s in many ways the reason why Walz actually ended up with the trifecta that he had in Minnesota, because of the kind of outrage that engendered among Minnesota voters, particularly any liberal-leaning voters. And that was one of the first bills that he signed, was a codification of abortion rights in Minnesota. And he went out of his way to kind of advertise Minnesota as a sanctuary for people around the country who needed to get abortions but were maybe unable to in their states. He said, you know, “You can come here, and you will not be prosecuted. We won’t work with surrounding states.” And obviously, the Democrats are very much hoping that that issue is going to propel the party to another victory in 2024. Trump and the Republicans have had to moderate on it, realizing that this is a massive political liability.

Healthcare, as well, it’s another one of the major cost concerns that Americans feel. I mean, it’s been that way for years, but consistently, in poll after poll, in survey after survey, Americans say that their healthcare bills, their medical bills that they get, are one of their biggest concerns.

Now, the thing that I think that Harris and Walz need to do is actually, beyond just using their own personal histories and kind of framing this in very empathetic language to try and connect with the voters, I think they need to offer them real solutions on this stuff. You know, I think something like codifying Roe v. Wade on a national level, that seems like a no-brainer. But I think they also need to present an actual healthcare plan beyond just kind of vague platitudes or simply talking about strengthening the Affordable Care Act. You know, there has to be something done to really make sure that people are able to get the healthcare they need, that they’re not going to be worried about going bankrupt. And I think unless people are given these concrete solutions to their concerns around affordability in their lives, which have been sky high since 2021, you know, I think that you can make all the kind of savvy VP picks that you want and all the good speeches, but ultimately it’s not going to get people wanting to go out and stand in line and vote for you in November.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Branko, we only have about a minute. I wanted to ask you: In terms of the conventional wisdom of many Democrats saying that Kamala Harris choosing Walz instead of Josh Shapiro from a key swing state like Pennsylvania or Mark Kelly from Arizona would not add that much to the ticket, what’s your sense of that?

BRANKO MARCETIC: I think that’s not true. I mean, I think Shapiro was a very risky pick, if he had been chosen, not just because of his stance on Israel-Palestine, but because of a number of scandals that were in his background. And the fact that he, in terms of his business friendliness, has wanted to cut corporate tax rates, it was completely out of step with both Harris and where a lot of the American public is.

I think there has been a sea change in the American political landscape. Walz’s record, for all the flaws that there are to his record — and, believe me, there are definitely many flaws — it’s still a very robust progressive record. And in the past, that would have been considered a liability. But I think, according to reports at least, you know, one of the big reasons that Harris chose Walz, one of the things that she saw in him as a viable governing partner, was the fact that he was someone who had done a lot of the things that she wants to do on a national level, and she thought that he could help her do that. And by the way, the things that she wants to do, the things that she’s talking about, the things that Walz has already done in Minnesota, if you look at surveys, they’re overwhelmingly popular among the American public, across partisan lines. So, I think, you know, that has been true for a long time, but it’s taken a long time for the Democratic Party, for the kind of establishment in Washington, to realize it. And so, we’re seeing these things start to really change before our eyes now.