The US election is fast approaching with the two candidates, Democratic pick Kamala Harris and Donald Trump for the GOP, making a last-minute push in key swing states.
Harris, Vice President to Joe Biden, officially became the Democratic nominee in early August after Biden, 81, announced he wouldn’t seek a second term after weeks of pressure over concerns about his mental fitness.
Days after being unveiled as the Dem’s choice to take on Trump, Harris named a former high school football coach as her running mate, confounding the predictions of most pundits in DC.
Minnesota Governor Tim Walz got the nod ahead of more prominent figures in the Democratic party, including Governor of Pennsylvania Josh Shapiro, who was widely seen as the leading candidate.
But Walz quickly showed why Harris saw him as an asset, earning plaudits for his folksy charm and bruising barbs towards Trump’s campaign. Here’s all you need to know.
Waltz, 60, has been the governor of Minnesota since 2018 and was re-elected in 2022.
After a long career in the military and in education, Waltz was elected to the US House of Representatives as a Democrat in 2007 and was reelected in 2008, 2010, 2012, 2014, and 2016.
He married Gwen Waltz, née Whipple, in 1994. The couple has two children, Hope, 23, and Gus, 18.
Walz has featured prominently on his daughter’s TikTok, including a video of the pair of them braving a ride at the annual Minnesota State Fair, and a humorous clip of him trying to coax Hope, a vegetarian, into having some turkey on Thanksgiving.
As Harris’ running mate, Walz has played up to his “goofball dad” image whilst characterising Trump and his running mate JD Vance as “weird” for their comments about women and abortion – seen as one of the Democrats’ stronger attack lines.
On the Middle East, Walz has – perhaps unsurprisingly – been aligned with Harris in affirming Israel’s right to defend itself following the October 7 terrorist attack by Hamas while urging restraint in Gaza.
Walz has been open about the fertility struggles he and his wife have suffered. The pair conceived their daughter through intrauterine insemination treatments, sometimes called IUI, and Walz was outspoken after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled earlier this year that frozen embryos made in IVF are legally children, condemning the move.
“I remember praying each night for a call, the pit in my stomach when the phone would ring, and the absolute agony when we heard the treatments hadn’t worked,” he said of the couple’s fertility woes, “It took me and Gwen years.”
In 2023, Walz signed legislation ensuring abortion rights in Minnesota remained in place following the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, as per CBS News.
On climate change, Walz aims for Minnesota to provide residents with 100% carbon-free electricity by 2040. In 2023, he signed legislation encouraging utility firms to build renewable energy plants in areas that were once home to fossil-fuel-generating facilities, according to Time Magazine.
Walz is a supporter of the Second Amendment and, while in Congress, had an “A” rating from the National Rifle Association (NRA).
But he started to champion more gun-control measures after becoming governor. He publically expressed his support for a ban on assault weapons after a shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, that left 17 people dead, as per the outlet.
He also signed a “red flag law”, which gives state officials the ability to temporarily take away firearms from someone ruled by a court to be a possible danger to themselves or others.
In a post on X earlier this year, Walz said: “I had an A rating from the NRA. Now I get straight F’s. And I sleep just fine.”
Where immigration is concerned, in 2021, Walz supported a pathway for “dreamers” and immigrants with “temporary protected status” to gain citizenship.
Last year, he signed a bill allowing undocumented immigrants in the state to get driver’s licences. However, Scripps News reports that during his time in Congress, his voting record showed support for toughening up border security and increasing screening for refugees.
Waltz, a Nebraska native, joined the Army National Guard at 17 and served in the volunteer force for over two decades, retiring as a Command Sergeant Major.
Before ascending to the upper echelons of the Democratic party, Walz, 60, was a teacher.
After completing his teacher training, he had a one-year post-teaching in China only two months after the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, when communist authorities opened fire on workers peacefully protesting for political reforms, killing hundreds and perhaps thousands, according to Amnesty International.
On his return to the US, he began teaching at a high school in his home state, where he met Gwen.
He then moved with her to her native Minnesota, where they taught at Mankato West High School.
Walz was also the school’s football coach, leading them to their first American football state championship, and is a proud hunter and ice fishing enthusiast.
Walz has occasionally faced claims of “inflating” his resume, such as when it emerged that he had falsely claimed to have been in Hong Kong during the Tiananmen Square protest.
When asked about it in the vice presidential debate against Trump’s running mate, JD Vance, Walz admitted, “I’m a knucklehead” and that he had “misspoken.”
