Harris Did the Right Thing: She Picked Walz and Rejected Shapiro
Harris Did the Right Thing: She Picked Walz and Rejected Shapiro
Why the Minnesota Governor is the progressives’ pick - and much better on Gaza.
In 2006, a Democratic candidate for Congress in Minnesota’s first House district released a radio ad entitled ‘Hope.’
“I am a retired Command Sergeant Major in the Minnesota National Guard and, after years of firing artillery, I sustained severe inner ear damage,” he said. “Because I have good health insurance provided through my employer, I was able to have surgery on my ear.”
He continued: “As my ear healed, my hearing was gradually restored. One morning, several weeks after the surgery, I awoke to a sound I couldn’t identify. I asked my wife what I was hearing and she told me: ‘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.”
The ad concluded with this zinger of a line from the candidate: “I am running for Congress because I believe we as a country have a moral obligation to ensure that every father can hear his daughter sing.”
The Democratic congressional candidate – a high school teacher and state championship-winning football coach – went on to win that GOP-leaning rural district, and spent six terms in the House of Representatives. He is currently serving his second term as governor of Minnesota.
On Tuesday morning, Vice President Kamala Harris chose Governor Tim Walz to be her vice-presidential running mate.
I still can’t quite believe she did it. Harris, the first Black and Indian woman to run for president of the United States, had her pick of eligible white guys. Josh Shapiro, the popular first-term Democratic governor of key swing state Pennsylvania and the choice of the donor class – especially “pro-Israel donors,” according to the New York Times. Mark Kelly, the former astronaut and Democratic senator from the key border and swing state of Arizona. Andy Beshear, the Democrat who won re-election as governor in Mitch McConnell’s ruby-red state of Kentucky. Pete Buttigieg, the young, gay, and eloquent transportation secretary.
In the end, it came down to Shapiro of Pennsylvania versus Walz of Minnesota. And Harris stunned me and many other progressives by going with the folksy and funny Walz, the progressives’ pick. She threw caution to the wind and, while Democratic Party centrists, ‘Never Trump’ conservatives, and Very Serious People in the media may mourn Shapiro’s absence on the ticket, I believe she made the right call.
Shapiro, who volunteered on an Israeli army base in his youth, tried to penalize Ben & Jerry’s for refusing to sell ice cream in illegal Israeli settlements, and spent the months since Oct. 7, 2023, defending Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza, refusing to call for a ceasefire, and comparing anti-war college protesters to the KKK, would have alienated key segments of the Democratic base – Arab-Americans in Michigan, Black pastors in Georgia, young and progressive voters across the country. (Plus, aside from Gaza, the teaching unions weren’t happy with the Pennsylvania governor’s education policies either.)
Progressives should be under no illusion: Walz is no friend of the Palestinians. But he doesn’t have a history of saying racist things about them either. He is not a part of the anti-war movement, but he doesn’t smear them as far-right extremists. This is what he said in March about the pro-Palestine Uncommitted movement: “These folks are asking for a change in course. They’re asking for more pressure to be put on. People are frustrated, but it bodes well for me that they’re actively engaged to go out and cast this vote and ask for change.”
Will Walz be the person who secures Harris a historic victory in the election come November? Unlikely. Vice presidents tend to have little impact on actual electoral outcomes. But he won’t harm her with the Democratic base in a way that Shapiro might have, he’ll surely help turn out progressives and young voters, and he’ll provide much-needed energy, charisma, and humor to the ticket. (I call him ‘America’s Fun Uncle.’)
What the Walz pick says to me is that whether or not the Democrats win in November, they won’t go down without a fight. Not with the Minnesota governor and 24-year veteran of the Army National Guard on the ticket, ready to spar and even brawl with the authoritarians and freaks on the right. If Donald Trump, his unpopular running mate, and the GOP as a whole want to get a sense of what is coming their way, they only need to check out some of Walz’s on-camera – and very viral! – moments from the past couple of weeks, as he loudly auditioned for the VP slot.
What did he say about Donald Trump? “Make that bastard wake up afterwards and know that a Black woman kicked his ass and sent him on the road.”
How about J.D. Vance? “People like JD Vance know nothing about small-town America… The ‘Golden Rule’ there is mind your own damn business.”
And the MAGA Republican Party? “These are weird people on the other side.”
Walz is an effective attack dog – but he is also much more than that. As I documented in The Guardian last month, he is one of the most successful and progressive governors in modern American history, passing gun control legislation, codifying abortion rights, expanding voting rights, and providing free school meals to schoolkids, among countless other popular and populist policies. Oh, and he did it all with a wafer-thin, one-seat majority in the Minnesota State Senate.
If Harris makes history and wins in November, against Trump and against the odds, she should take a page out of Walz’s playbook in Minnesota from the moment she enters the Oval Office.
“You don't win elections to bank political capital,” the governor tweeted in June 2023 after wrapping up an insanely productive legislative session, “you win elections to burn political capital and improve lives.”
💯 Mehdi. The first thing I read upon waking up this morning was that Walz was Kamala’s choice. Big sigh of relief. Shapiro would have been the worst choice.
I'm a LOCAL Democratic activist, retired professor of education (Rutgers), married to my wife, and hail from rural Appalachia (a town of 600 people--no stop light). I'm DELIRIOUS with JOY that VP Harris picked Governor Walz. He's a working class kid that has taken EVERY opportunity that came his way and did VERY well. So, he's a retired Command Master Sargent, which is a huge deal. He speaks Mandarin. The year he coached his HS football team to a state championship (1999), he also advised the school's Gay-Straight Alliance, when teachers could be FIRED for doing such a think. He holds a Masters Degree in Educational Leadership from Mankato State, a great regional university, especially for education.
What does an educator bring? He can TEACH the policy initiatives to the American public in every day language. It's why he's so deadly funny with the press (and his "weird" barb is so spot on!). He shows what working class kids CAN achieve if given the chances we deserve. Anyway, I'm thrilled and will work like a dog that not only do these candidates win, but every single Dem down ballot from them.