Harris’s VP Pick will be??

I really hope it isn't Mark Kelly. Ugh

Just read an article by John Heilemann from Puck News, which I subscribe to strictly for his incisive and humorous political commentary, which I came to admire after watching HBO Max's The Circus. Speculating on the VP pick, he says that Democrats have little appetite for an outside the box candidate after the roller-coaster-y past few weeks.

Shapiro has been viewed as an obvious choice, but Dems in the know also like Walz for the way he's handled himself in interviews, and the way he lucidly criticized T and his uber-Right minions, “These are weird people on the other side. They want to take books away. They want to be in your exam room. Don’t sugarcoat this, these are weird ideas. Listen to them speak, listen to how they talk about things.”


Heilemann said interviews like this captured KH's attention, those closest to her and a whole lot of other Dems. Nancy Pelosi and Bernie have been talking him up.

In an interview I watched, I liked his simple and direct no-nonsense communication style which I assume comes from his time in the military, but he also possessed a likable and relatable warmth as when talking about his children.

Kamala Harris has selected Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz to be her running mate in the race to be the next president.

The name was released by CNN on Tuesday.

I didn't see that coming! What advantages do ya'll see for Walz over Shapiro or Kelly? I'm not opposed to him, I just don't know much about him at all.

Military, football coach, teacher.

Here is an article from ABC 7 LA:

abc7.com/post/who-is-tim-walz-kamala-harris-vp-pick/15149812/

Vice President Kamala Harris is poised to pick Minn. Gov. Tim Walz as her vice presidential running mate. Who is the two-term governor joining her on the ticket?

Walz, who grew up in the small town of West Point, Nebraska, was a social studies teacher, football coach and union member at Mankato West High School in Minnesota before he got into politics.

He won the first of six terms in Congress in 2006 from a mostly rural southern Minnesota district, and used the office to champion veterans issues. Walz served 24 years in the Army National Guard, rising to command sergeant major, one of the highest enlisted ranks in the military.

He ran for governor in 2018 on the theme of "One Minnesota" and won by more than 11 points.

As governor, Walz had to find ways to work in his first term with a legislature that was split between a Democratic-controlled House and a Republican-led Senate. Minnesota has a history of divided government, though, and the arrangement was surprisingly productive in his first year. But the COVID-19 pandemic hit Minnesota early in his second year, and bipartisan cooperation soon frayed.

Walz relied on emergency powers to lead the state's response. Republicans chafed under restrictions that included lockdowns, closing schools and shuttering businesses. They retaliated by firing or forcing out some of his agency heads. But Minnesotans who were stuck at home also got to know Walz better through his frequent afternoon briefings in the early days of the crisis, which were broadcast and streamed statewide.

Walz won reelection in 2022 by nearly 8 points over his GOP challenger, Dr. Scott Jensen, a physician and vaccine skeptic. Not only did Walz win, Democrats kept control of the House and flipped the Senate to win the "trifecta" of full control of both chambers and the governor's office for the first time in eight years. A big reason was the Supreme Court's Dobbs decision, which held that the Constitution doesn't include a right to abortion. That hurt Minnesota Republicans, especially among suburban women.

"Tim has been in the news because the country and the world is seeing the guy we love so much," U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar Klobuchar said Monday.

Ken Martin, Chairman of the Minnesota-Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party said young people he spoke to on the campaign trail were "Walz pilled."

Walz and other Democrats went into the 2023 legislative session with an ambitious agenda - and a whopping $17.6 billion budget surplus to help fund it. Their proudest accomplishments included sweeping protections for abortion rights that included the elimination of nearly all restrictions Republicans had enacted in prior years, including a 24-hour waiting period and parental consent requirements. They also enacted new protections for trans rights, making the state a refuge for families coming from out of state for treatment for trans children.

Their other major accomplishments included tax credits for families with children that were aimed at slashing childhood poverty, as well as universal free school breakfasts and lunches for all students, regardless of family income. They also enacted a paid family and medical leave program, legalized recreational marijuana for adults and made it easier to vote.

Republicans complained that Walz and his fellow Democrats squandered a surplus that would have been better spent on permanent tax relief for everyone. And they've faulted the governor and his administration for lax oversight of pandemic programs that cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars.

Federal prosecutors charged 70 people with defrauding federal food programs that funded meals for kids during the pandemic out of $250 million on Walz's watch. Known as the Feeding Our Future scandal, it's one of the country's largest pandemic aid fraud cases. The Office of the Legislative Auditor, a nonpartisan watchdog, delivered a scathing report in June that said Walz's Department of Education "failed to act on warning signs," did not effectively exercise its authority and was ill-prepared to respond.

Republicans still criticize Walz for his response to the sometimes violent unrest that followed the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer in 2020, which included the torching of a police station.

During a May fundraiser in St. Paul, Trump repeated his false claim that he was responsible for deploying the National Guard to quell the violence. "The entire city was burning down. ... If you didn't have me as president, you wouldn't have Minneapolis today," Trump said

It was actually Walz who gave the order, which he issued in response to requests from the mayors of Minneapolis and St. Paul. But within Minnesota, GOP legislators said both Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey were too slow to act. And there was finger-pointing between Frey and Walz on who was responsible for not activating the Guard faster.

Walz has served often as a Biden-Harris surrogate, and has made increasingly frequent appearances on national television. They've included an interview on Fox News that irritated Trump so much that he posted on Truth Social, "They make me fight battles I shouldn't have to fight." Walz is also co-chair of the rules committee for the Democratic National Convention. And he led a White House meeting of Democratic governors with Biden following the president's disastrous performance in his debate with Trump.

Putting Walz on the ticket could help Democrats hold the state's 10 electoral votes and bolster the party more broadly in the Midwest. No Republican has won a statewide race in Minnesota since Tim Pawlenty was re-elected governor in 2006, but GOP candidates for attorney general and state auditor came close in 2022.

Trump finished just 1.5 percentage points behind Democrat Hillary Clinton in the state in 2016. While Biden carried Minnesota by more than 7 points in 2020, Trump has taken to falsely claiming that he won the state last time and can do it again.

Minnesota has produced two vice presidents, Hubert Humphrey and Walter Mondale.