What Does Tim Walz Bring to the Democratic Ticket?

Everything, topped with a grin as big as a Boundary Waters canoe

Aug 06, 2024

Tim Walz cuddling a sleeping piglet at a 4H booth at the 2019 Minnesota State Fair. Photo credit: Office of the Governor of Minnesota/Facebook

How can you not love a man who is clearly taking such genuine pleasure in cuddling a sleeping piglet? In fact, can you think of any other person running for the White House this year, or in the past 4-5 cycles—except for George W. Bush—who would actually know how to hold a piglet? And perhaps it won’t surprise you to learn that Walz was also a high school teacher, a member of the National Guard, and a football coach before he went into politics. You can read more about Walz here.

Politico explains that the Minnesota Governor was the whole package:

Harris appreciated Walz’s two terms as governor because he had accomplishments in Minnesota that Harris wants to replicate in her presidency — access to reproductive health, paid leave, child tax credits and gun safety.
Harris was also taken with Walz’s biography — a former high school teacher, a football coach and a veteran who flipped a Republican-leaning district in 2006 — which she believes will play well in all three of the Blue Wall states of Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, including his win as a House member in a Republican district.
Walz is seen by Harris’ camp as a deft messenger, popularizing “weird” as a messaging framework to describe former President Donald Trump and Sen. JD Vance — a cutting and clear tagline that went viral over the last two weeks.

There’s more: Walz speaks to the best of what the Democratic Party was prior to the neoliberal turn of the 1990s. The guy is an old-school liberal in the progressive tradition of fellow Minnesotans Walter Mondale, Paul Wellstone, Hubert Humphrey, and sitting Senator Amy Klobuchar. At a moment when nearly everyone has forgotten how to talk about politics outside a polarized “left” and “right” Walz is a politician who functions in that largely forgotten space of social possibility and care we used to call liberalism before the term was ~~stolen~~ repurposed by left-wingers to describe weak-kneed moderates.

Because politics is now a reality show, we have all been filling what is normally dead time for campaigning with wild speculations about who would by Kamala Harris’s pick for Vice President, and why. As you listen to the post-mortem, here are some things to know about how experts discuss a VP pick.

There will be a lot of talk about “chemistry.” Understanding that Walz would have good chemistry with a freshly-caught walleye (a tasty member of the perch family common to Minnesota’s Boundary Waters region), it’s important to remember that he and Harris will look forward to spending an awful lot of time together: anything from four months to eight and a half years.

That said, as I can tell, the potential for matching pyjamas was not mentioned as a factor in the Veep stakes until Hillary Clinton decided on Virginia Senator Tim Kaine, one of the blandest individuals I have ever seen on a national stage. Other 21st century tickets not headed by a woman leaned towards the practical. Bush’s Dick Cheney, was (more or less) chosen for him because Bush was not perceived as very smart; Obama chose Biden because of his experience and connections on the Hill; and Biden chose Harris because she was accomplished and to show his commitment to a democratic future when women and people of color weren’t just standing behind the candidate.

Historically, Presidential candidates have as often as not, treated their ticket mates and governing partners with contempt. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was one: he detested John Nancy Garner, distrusted Henry Wallace, and thought Harry S Truman was a dimwit.

So why did FDR choose any of these men?

Because back in the day, you chose a VP to win a particular state or region. In each case, FDR was trying to balance the ticket with someone who wasn’t an effete member of the Eastern elite branch of the Democratic Party. But whereas today, the parties have ideological differences that play themselves out regionally, back then, both parties had regional differences that played themselves out ideologically.

For example, John F. Kennedy (who detested his own Vice-Presidential pick, Lyndon Johnson) needed to hold the Democratic South, a conservative, segregationist wing of the party that was slipping away due to growing support among Democrats for Black civil rights. In fact, there are those who argue that choosing Johnson secured Texas, and the election, for JFK (you will also note in the illustration below that Richard Nixon won California in 1960, and not just because he was from there, but because California was very conservative.)

Graphic courtesy of 270toWin.

But politics have changed since the mid-20th century. For example, Donald Trump has never won New York or New Jersey, despite being strongly identified with a business and entertainment career in both states and being registered to vote in New York City in 2016. Choosing Dock Cheney basically brought George W. Bush one electoral vote from a state that hasn’t voted Democratic in decades—and Dick Cheney!

Choosing Biden was a similar strategy for the Obama campaign, except that—and this is relevant—Biden was the “Pennsylvania” candidate. He has strong ties to the state, is popular there, and if we are being honest, Delaware is a separate state from Pennsylvania in name only.

Can you convert to paid? Go for it!

The Walz choice should have a similar impact on Wisconsin and Michigan (states that Harris has clawed back to a statistical tie.) And if I were Harris, I would also send Walz into Ohio to stump for Senator Sherrod Brown, whose seat will be essential to holding the Senate. By doing that, the Democrats also lay the groundwork to turn Ohio purple again.

But—you ask—isn’t Pennsylvania the key to a Harris victory, and wouldn’t that argue for Shapiro? My answer is: yes, and not exactly.

I cannot emphasize enough that, as Governor, Shapiro is going to fight like hell to win his state for the Harris-Walz ticket and—as importantly, to keep pulling the Pennsylvania State Legislature back into the Democratic column. And I trust him to do that.

But here’s what the math looks like: except for Ed Gilgore, who sees a possible opening in Georgia, most political strategists agree that the Harris-Walz ticket must win Pennsylvania. However, they have three paths to victory that we could call “Pennsylvania +” and those additional states include Arizona, Nevada, Wisconsin, and Michigan. Trump, on the other hand, has a narrower route to 270. He can afford to lose Pennsylvania—but should he do so, he has no path to victory that does not include Michigan and Wisconsin.

Denying Trump those states is crucial to get Harris to 270. Having Tim Walz do what only he could do—flash that big, warm smile; using an educator’s ability to explain policy to swing voters, and beaming out Dad vibes at state fairs and other community events—could easily block Trump and bring those states home for Harris.

Walz is also the biggest advertisement the Democrats have that they, not the Republicans, are the party that supports families. Minnesota, in part because of policies passed under Walz is ranked the third most family-friendly state in the nation, topped only by North Dakota (where women can no longer get health care and LGBT people are second-class citizens), and my own state, Massachusetts.

A vice-presidential candidate should bring qualities to the ticket that strengthen it. Again, not always true: do you remember Dan Quayle? Sarah Palin?

That said, a Vice President is a plus-one during the campaign, and can speak to and about issues that the Presidential candidate cannot. Again, if we look at Obama picking Biden, the latter’s expertise in foreign policy and the judiciary made up for Obama’s deficits there. Biden also got out front on gay marriage when Obama, for whatever reason, did not feel that he could. Another example: when Bill Clinton was vetting candidates, he probably did not say: “I want a super-wonky guy who knows a lot about science,” but he got one—and probably wanted to not repeat Jimmy Carter’s disastrous experience of coming to Washington in 1977 with no relationships. Gore had relationships Clinton did not: in addition to being a Senator, he had practically grown up in the Capitol.

What does Harris get from Walz? Well, he is a Governor of a state that is both agricultural and industrial, one that has been grappling with the decline of its mining industry for years. Racial politics are not just Black/White in Minnesota, but reflect the growing diversity of the nation. The state has large and influential Native American population, as well as newer immigrant ethnic groups—Hmong, Somali—that are beginning to play a prominent role in the state’s political life. In other words, we are talking about a man who embraces, and can talk about, social and cultural complexity on every level.

Frankly, I can’t wait for tonight’s official announcements to celebrate a little more. And mostly?

I’m looking forward to the next round of national polling, which should put Trump another 1-3 points under water.

Political Junkie

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