Tim Walz Accepts VP Nomination; A Look at His Record on George Floyd Murder, IVF, Guns and Gaza

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org. We’re “Breaking with Convention: War, Peace and the Presidency.” I’m Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: Minnesota Governor Tim Walz accepted the Democratic nomination for vice president on the third night of the Democratic National Convention here in Chicago. Walz has served as governor of Minnesota since 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. During his speech on Wednesday, Walz made repeated references to his time as a coach. He also outlined his achievements as governor.

GOV. TIM WALZ: We cut taxes for the middle class. We passed paid family and medical leave. We invested in fighting crime and affordable housing. We cut the cost of prescription drugs and helped people escape the kind of medical debt that nearly sank my family. And we made sure that every kid in our state gets breakfast and lunch every day. So, while other states were banning books from their schools, we were banishing hunger from ours.

We also protected reproductive freedom, because in Minnesota we respect our neighbors and the personal choices they make. And even if we wouldn’t make those same choices for ourselves, we’ve got a Golden Rule: Mind your own damn business. And that includes IVF and fertility treatments. This is personal for Gwen and I. If you’ve never experienced the hell that is infertility, I guarantee you, you know somebody who has. And I can remember praying each night for a phone call, the pit in your stomach when the phone would ring, and the absolute agony when we heard the treatments hadn’t worked. It took Gwen and I years. But we had access to fertility treatments. And when our daughter was born, we named her Hope. Hope, Gus and Gwen, you are my entire world, and I love you.

I’m letting you in on how we started a family because this is a big part about what this election is about: freedom. When Republicans use the word “freedom,” they mean that the government should be free to invade your doctor’s office, corporations free to pollute your air and water, and banks free to take advantage of customers. But when we Democrats talk about freedom, we mean the freedom to make a better life for yourself and the people that you love, freedom to make your own healthcare decisions, and, yeah, your kids’ freedom to go to school without worrying about being shot dead in the hall.

Look, I know guns. I’m a veteran. I’m a hunter. And I was a better shot than most Republicans in Congress, and I got the trophies to prove it. But I’m also a dad. I believe in the Second Amendment, but I also believe our first responsibility is to keep our kids safe.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: Democratic vice-presidential nominee Tim Walz speaking on Wednesday night. He also criticized the Trump-Vance Republican ticket.

GOV. TIM WALZ: Some folks just don’t understand what it takes to be a good neighbor. Take Donald Trump and JD Vance. Their Project 2025 will make things much, much harder for people who are just trying to live their lives. They spend a lot of time pretending they know nothing about this. But look, I coached high school football long enough to know — and trust me on this — when somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re going to use it. And we know, if these guys get back in the White House, they’ll start jacking up the costs on the middle class, they’ll repeal the Affordable Care Act, they’ll gut Social Security and Medicare, and they will ban abortion across this country, with or without Congress.

Here’s the thing: It’s an agenda nobody asked for. It’s an agenda that serves nobody except the richest and the most extreme amongst us. And it’s an agenda that does nothing for our neighbors in need. Is it weird? Absolutely. Absolutely. But it’s also wrong, and it’s dangerous. It’s not just me saying so; it’s Trump’s own people. They were with him for four years. They’re warning us that the next four years will be much, much worse.

AMY GOODMAN: That’s Minnesota Governor Tim Walz accepting the Democratic vice-presidential nomination last night here in Chicago at the Democratic National Convention.

We’re joined right now by two guests. Still with us, Minneapolis City Councilmember Jeremiah Ellison, and we’re joined by Branko Marcetic, a staff writer at Jacobin who’s been writing about Governor Walz. In fact, we had you on when Kamala Harris first chose him.

If you can talk about not only his history, but also now the controversies that have come out, or what the Republicans are trying to go after him for?

BRANKO MARCETIC: Yeah. Walz is considered a very progressive pick for running mate, but he didn’t start out as a progressive firebrand. He was a guy who won a conservative rural district in Minnesota. He kept it for another decade, and then he ran for governor on kind of a not particularly progressive platform. He was more of the centrist in the race. And he ended up winning.

And then, when he won reelection, he got a trifecta in the Minnesota state House. He ended up using that political capital to pass a flurry of progressive legislation — paid family leave and medical leave, universal school meals, legalized marijuana. He put forward a very ambitious renewable energy law, as well, a lot of worker protections. And you can go down the list.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, didn’t he go from 100% support of the NRA to — went way the other way in terms of pushing for gun control?

BRANKO MARCETIC: Yeah, very much so. He was a guy — when he was in the House, he was a staunch supporter of gun rights. And then, once he started to run for governor, he used that power to curb the proliferation of guns. That’s one of the controversies that came out about him. While he was trying to make the case for the need to curb the gun problem in the U.S., he said, you know, “These weapons of war that I carried in war should not be around.” People pointed out he didn’t actually serve a combat role in Iraq, so he was kind of embellishing his résumé there. People that defend him would say, “Well, but he wasn’t embellishing his résumé to make himself look better; he was doing it to make the case for why this should be done.”

There’s a few other controversies that now are dogging him. Probably the one that Republicans are most trying to pin on him is that he retired from the National Guard. He served, I think, for 24 years. That’s a big part of his résumé. It’s part of his appeal to rural America, to more conservative voters. When he retired, a few months later — he retired in May 2005. In August 2005, his unit got the call-up to be deployed in Iraq. People have said — even though the timeline does not make it seem like he dodged service, people are saying, “Well, there’s no way he wouldn’t have known that he was going to be deployed. He did this as a way to kind of get out of actually having to serve.” But at the same time, the Minnesota National Guard has said that he had actually filed his papers to retire five to seven months before that May date. So that one’s a little more dubious.

One that, you know, has more truth to it, but may not matter as much, is that Walz has been saying for months now — not months, for weeks now, that he and his wife went through IVF treatment for infertility. And, you know, he’s trying to connect to voters, number one, who have had that problem, but also the fact that Republicans have taken aim at IVF, and it’s a very unpopular position. And it turns out that he and his wife didn’t quite use IVF; they used a different fertility treatment. Again, whether this is a scandal that matters, it’s in the eye of the beholder. I’ve seen some people say, you know, some voters say, at the end of the day, he’s just trying to use his biography to connect; he’s not necessarily using this to kind of make himself look better. It’s more just to be able to say to voters, “I know what you’ve been through,” and use his own biography for that.

So, that’s some of the stuff that Republicans have tried to pin on him. You know, whether it sticks, I’m not sure. At the moment, he has a far lower negative unfavorability than JD Vance, for instance, who very quickly saw his ratings plummet because of a series of quite damaging interviews that he had done long before he was picked. Walz right now is looking pretty good. So, you know, it remains to be seen. We’ll see in the coming months whether any of this stuff actually sticks.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: Well, you said that his political résumé could have been a liability, could have been considered a liability, a political liability for Harris, but in fact it has not been. So, if you could explain what you think the significance of that is, what that says about a shift in the political spectrum, possibly, and also why you think she made that — this selection, why Walz —

BRANKO MARCETIC: Yeah.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: — and not Josh Shapiro, which many people thought initially was her top choice?

BRANKO MARCETIC: Yeah, totally. Josh Shapiro, in many ways, if you look at his résumé, that’s exactly what almost any other election before this would be considered the safe choice. Walz has a very progressive record. In previous decades, that would be used as a cudgel against him. It would be seen as a liability. This would be a problem that he did all this progressive stuff.

Reportedly, Harris, one of the things that she liked about him, besides the fact that he told her, “I don’t want to run for president,” which I’m not sure if I totally believe that, but she apparently wants to pass something similar, a program that’s very similar to what Walz did when he had that trifecta in Minnesota, and she wants to do it on the national level. So, she thought, you know, “Here’s a guy who actually used his power, used his political capital to get things done. That experience will be useful for me to have.”

And I think, beyond that, I mean, his biography adds a level of diversity, which at first might sound strange. He’s an old white guy, and there’s been a million old white men as vice president and president. But Walz’s background is pretty unique in the context of the current Democratic Party. He is a union member. He’s a public school teacher. He has roots in rural America.

AMY GOODMAN: Born in Nebraska.

BRANKO MARCETIC: Yeah, that’s right. Yeah, completely. Yeah, he’s from the Midwest.

AMY GOODMAN: Farming family.

BRANKO MARCETIC: Yeah, absolutely. He’s a guy who genuinely hunts and fishes. You know, he had that 24 years of military service.

AMY GOODMAN: Doesn’t own three houses, doesn’t own two houses, in fact, doesn’t own one house.

BRANKO MARCETIC: Yeah, yeah, doesn’t invest in stocks, which is, depressingly, a unique thing now among politicians. And yeah, he’s someone who — he’s not from an Ivy League school. He doesn’t have some kind of elite background. He’s not a lawyer. This is all very different, a very different kind of class background to what’s usually picked.

AMY GOODMAN: Jeremiah Ellison, I wanted to turn to you. You know the Minnesota governor. You’re a Minneapolis city councilmember. You also know the Minnesota attorney general —

JEREMIAH ELLISON: Yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: — Keith Ellison. He’s your father. He also addressed the DNC on Wednesday night and began his speech by talking about Walz’s response to the Minneapolis police murder of George Floyd.

ATTORNEY GENERAL KEITH ELLISON: Friends, I’ll never forget when I first saw the video of the murder of George Floyd. I was heartbroken. I was angry. And that morning, my phone rang. And on that line was Governor Tim Walz. Tim Walz felt the exact same way I did. And a few days later, Tim appointed me to prosecute Floyd’s murder.

Almost a year after that, minutes after the guilty verdict came down, my phone rang again. And it was Vice President Kamala Harris calling to congratulate my team and the work.

Now, Kamala and Tim, they understand the legacy of George Floyd. No one is above the law, and no one is beneath it. No one is outside the circle of our compassion.

AMY GOODMAN: So, that’s Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, who was the first Muslim U.S. congressmember before he was attorney general. Jeremiah Ellison, you’re on the Minneapolis City Council. You’re a longtime anti-police brutality activist. I remember in 2015, that famous picture of you when you were protesting the death of Jamar Clark of — who was it? A trooper?

JEREMIAH ELLISON: Yeah, I think it was an MPD officer with a —

AMY GOODMAN: Minneapolis Police Department officer with an automatic weapon?

JEREMIAH ELLISON: Yeah, it was one of the — it was like a marker round, one of those less-than-lethal weapons, but huge cannon on it, yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: Against your head.

JEREMIAH ELLISON: Yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: And you were also very active around George Floyd. Talk about the governor’s role, I mean, taking it out of the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office because he wouldn’t prosecute the police and giving it to Attorney General Keith Ellison.

JEREMIAH ELLISON: Yeah. Well, the Hennepin County attorney at the time, he was willing to prosecute, but on a lesser charge. And I think that my dad’s office, the governor, they felt like higher charges, more severe charges were possible, that they were lawful to bring forward. And so, you know, he handed the case over to my dad. And, you know, I think a lot of folks saw the end result of that. My dad built a good team, had a lot of support from the governor to build that team, and they prosecuted Derek Chauvin.

AMY GOODMAN: And all four police officers were found guilty.

JEREMIAH ELLISON: And all four, yes, all four police officers, that’s right.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: So, could you give an overall assessment? Like, what is Walz’s position on policing, safety?

AMY GOODMAN: And Trump’s attack on him, who says, “You didn’t bring in the National Guard in time”?

JEREMIAH ELLISON: You know, look, it’s easy sort of in hindsight to look at what happened in Minneapolis and say that you would have had all the answers. I think that, you know, we were all responding, elected officials all responding in real time. We didn’t always agree. I wasn’t always in agreement with the mayor. I wasn’t always in agreement with what the governor was doing. But I recognize that they were all responding in real time, trying to make sure that we could get some peace on the street there. I think people were really demanding that the governor hand the case over to my dad’s office.

And, you know, my overall assessment is that, you know, whatever the disagreements, however reluctantly, I really like Tim. I think that he’s done a good job as governor. And I think that he was the right pick to stand by Kamala Harris and be his VP pick. But, you know, we’ve got — his views on police brutality, his views on police reform, I think, are — they’re pretty moderate, right? He’s moving at the pace that Minnesotans will allow him, maybe not always moving at the pace that I would want to see him move at. But I do think that he’s sincere in his efforts to see change, and I think that he’s sincere in his efforts to bring some accountability to how policing functions in Minnesota.

AMY GOODMAN: We also wanted to go back to your father, the Attorney General Keith Ellison, who spoke last night, one of the few who directly addressed the issue of Gaza from the stage.

ATTORNEY GENERAL KEITH ELLISON: Kamala and Tim, they fight for the people. And they also listen. And when they say we need a ceasefire and an end to the loss of innocent lives in Gaza and to bring hostages home, they’re listening, friends. They agree with us.

AMY GOODMAN: Again, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison was the first Muslim congressmember. He represented Minneapolis. And you are also an uncommitted delegate, Jeremiah, as a Minneapolis city councilmember. You’re wearing a pin right now that we’re seeing all over the convention, as well as a number of people wearing keffiyehs. But your pin is an artist project, “Not Another Bomb,” with a flower for the “O.” If you can talk about the significance of what Keith Ellison said, and your position, what’s happening, what you did in the Minnesota delegation, people holding up the names of the dead in Gaza?

JEREMIAH ELLISON: Yeah. You know, our effort here is to come and build solidarity with Harris delegates. We’re uncommitted because we feel like we haven’t seen this ticket show and prove how they’re going to save lives. We want to know what that strategy is. We have ideas — again, not sending weapons is one of those ideas — about how to achieve a ceasefire. But we didn’t come here to, you know, rain on people’s parade. I think that we have had that effect, because we haven’t seen any of our demands met. We’ve had productive conversations with the DNC. We’ve had productive conversations with Kamala’s team. But we haven’t seen those demands met in earnest.

AMY GOODMAN: And that demand particularly?

JEREMIAH ELLISON: We haven’t seen a speaker, and we haven’t seen —

AMY GOODMAN: A Palestinian American speaker.

JEREMIAH ELLISON: A Palestinian American speaker. And we’ve heard a lot about a ceasefire. We’ve heard many, many of the speakers name that a ceasefire is needed, name their support for a ceasefire. The family members of the Israeli hostage named the need for a ceasefire, named the need for the end to killing in Gaza. And yet, a Palestinian American cannot share that stage to also make that call. It feels hypocritical to us. The DNC’s platform says they don’t value Israeli lives or Palestinian lives over one another. And yet, by not having a Palestinian American be able to speak from that stage and address this crowd, you’re showing that you do. You’re showing that you have a hierarchy of who’s valued and whose life matters and whose doesn’t. And so, that’s one of those low demands.

Ultimately, our primary demand is for policy change. It’s for an arms embargo, because we believe that that’s the only strategy that’s going to successfully create a ceasefire, a permanent ceasefire. And so, we’re there on the floor. We’re making those calls. It was significant — and I’ve talked to some of my fellow uncommitted delegates. It was significant, my dad’s statement to folks. They really felt like he’s standing a solidarity with us, which, again, was the whole purpose — right? — was to come here and say — not tell Harris delegates that they shouldn’t support who they want to support, but to say, “Stand with us. Sign our ceasefire letter. Call for an arms embargo. You can support your candidate, but stand with us in holding your candidate accountable.”

If we could have gotten those things, our hope was that we could walk in uncommitted, but with seeing some of those demands met, walk out committed, walk out excited to go knock doors and make phone calls and say, “Hey, this is the candidate that’s going to end the genocide.” We haven’t seen that yet.

AMY GOODMAN: We want to thank you both for being with us. We’re going to continue this discussion, Minneapolis City Councilmember Jeremiah Ellison and Branko Marcetic, staff writer at Jacobin. We will link to your articles on Walz and covering the conventions.

That does it for this show. We are broadcasting for two hours every day from the Chicago convention. Go to democracynow.org. I’m Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh, here in Chicago.