5 things you should know about Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz

Until just a few weeks ago, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz had a limited national profile, especially compared to other Democratic governors. But Tuesday morning, the Midwesterner emerged from a lightning-quick vetting process as the Democratic nominee for vice president in the November elections.

“I am proud to announce that I’ve asked Tim Walz to be my running mate,” wrote Vice President Kamala Harris on social media. “As a governor, a coach, a teacher and a veteran, he’s delivered for working families like his. It's great to have him on the team.”

Harris selected Walz from a field that included governors Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania and J.B. Pritzker of Illinois, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, and U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona.

Walz, the chair of the Democratic Governors Association, started garnering attention for himself in the last few weeks for unleashing the current buzzword of the campaign. In several TV appearances over the past year, Walz has described Republicans, particularly former President Donald Trump and now his running mate, JD Vance, as “weird.” The folksy description has quickly caught on with other Democratic leaders, giving the party a way to talk about Trump that the Democrats have sorely lacked in the months leading up to President Joe Biden’s decision not to run for another term.

But Walz also comes to the national ticket with a considerable record of legislative victories in Minnesota that will surely be scrutinized in the coming months.

Walz first won election to governor in 2018, after his predecessor, incumbent Democratic Gov. Mark Dayton, decided not to seek reelection. His first term was dominated by the COVID-19 outbreak and the mass protests sparked by the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis in 2020. Most of Walz’s biggest legislative accomplishments came after the 2022 elections, when his party won complete control of the legislature.

Since then, Walz and his colleagues in the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party (Minnesota’s version of the Democratic Party) have racked up several policy changes. They put in place legal protections for abortion and people seeking gender-affirming care. They offered students free breakfast and lunch at school. They legalized marijuana, mandated family and medical leave, imposed clean energy mandates for electric companies, passed a long-stalled transportation bill and expanded voting rights to former prisoners.

“Gov. Walz has shown the country the power of spending political capital rather than banking it, leading the ‘Minnesota Miracle’ that enshrined reproductive freedom into state law, expanded voting rights, ensured universal free school meals, is tackling gun violence, combating climate change, and growing the economy for the middle class,” said Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly, the vice chair of the Democratic Governors Association, in a statement Tuesday.

Meanwhile, Republicans plan to scrutinize Walz’s Minnesota record, arguing that his priorities are more in line with “national Democrats” than local constituents.

“While Walz will try to sell himself as a relatable moderate, his record shows that he consistently backs the most liberal policies that national Democrats have to offer and will be in lockstep with the Democrat agenda that has already failed Americans,” wrote Sara Craig, the executive director of the Republican Governors Association in a statement Tuesday.

To that end, here are five things to know about Walz’s record in Minnesota:

Expanded Reproductive Rights

The DFL took control of the state Senate by a single vote in the 2022 elections, in which Democrats nationally fared better than expected because of backlash to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision earlier that year to overturn the constitutional right to an abortion. 

It was the party’s first priority in St. Paul that legislative session, with Democrats passing a bill in their first month in power to specify that “every individual has a fundamental right to make autonomous decisions about the individual’s own reproductive health,” including abortion and contraception. The law did not change the legal status of abortion in Minnesota, but it was intended to prevent future state court judges from curtailing those rights.

“After last year’s landmark election across this country, we’re the first state to take legislative action to put these protections in place,” Walz said at the time.

The governor also signed measures to protect people from other states who sought abortions in Minnesota from legal actions taken by their home states.

Increased Representation of Women in State Government

When Walz was still a member of Congress running for governor, he tapped a two-term state lawmaker, Peggy Flanagan, to be his running mate. If Walz becomes vice president, Flanagan would become the first female governor of Minnesota. Flanagan, who is a member of the White Earth Nation, would also become the first female Native American governor in the country.

Earlier this year, Walz also named two women to the state Supreme Court, giving the high court a female majority once again. Flanagan said that was significant, given that Minnesota had the first state supreme court with a majority of women in 1991. Young girls, Flanagan said, should “dream big. There is a place for her at the Capitol and on the Supreme Court.” Walz’s latest two nominees—Theodora Gaïtas and Sarah Hennesy—also both had experience as public defenders.

Advocated for Veterans Issues

Walz enlisted with the National Guard out of high school and served for 24 years before retiring as a command sergeant major. 

Perhaps unsurprisingly then, veterans’ issues have been at the center of Waltz’s political career in Congress and as governor. While a member of the U.S. House, Walz served as the top Democrat on the House Veterans Affairs Committee. One of his biggest accomplishments in that role was the passage of a 2015 law to increase mental health programs in the Department of Veterans Affairs that are designed to prevent suicides.

As governor, Walz signed what has been described as pioneering legislation that allows veterans to avoid jail time for certain crimes if they treat the underlying trauma related to their service instead. Veterans diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, traumatic brain injuries, sexual trauma, substance abuse or mental health issues are eligible for the relief. They must show a connection between their military service and the charged offense.

Walz is also a co-chair of the Council of Governors, a group of governors that advises federal officials on Guard-related matters. As part of that group, he opposed a decision by the Biden administration to move state Air National Guard units into the Space Force.

Deployed the National Guard During George Floyd Protests

Walz was criticized during the 2020 unrest in Minneapolis for not deploying the National Guard sooner to quell the violence. Mayor Jacob Frey asked the governor for 600 troops to deal with the escalating situation, but Walz waited until the next day to send them. 

“It was obvious to me that he froze under pressure, under a calamity, as people’s properties were being burned down,” state Sen. Warren Limmer, a Republican, told The New York Times. The state Senate, which was controlled by Republicans at the time of the unrest, blamed Walz for hesitating, saying the former guardsman was “having a philosophical debate” about whether to use force to stop the violence.

Trump, who was president at the time, falsely claimed that he was the one responsible for eventually deploying the Guard. “I brought it out five days after they started,” Trump said in a TV interview then. “They wouldn’t use the National Guard. I brought the National Guard to—I told them, I said, ‘You got to get the National Guard.’ We got them in. Everything stopped in Minneapolis. It was really an amazing thing, actually, to see, and they had no problems after we called out the Guard.”

Went Big on Transportation

As governor, Walz has pushed for several initiatives to reduce greenhouse gas pollution and promote alternative modes of transportation.

When first taking office, Walz called for increasing the state’s per-gallon fuel tax by 20 cents, although that idea languished. After Democrats took control of the legislature, they instead raised taxes and fees that were expected to bring in $1.3 billion in new revenue as part of a transportation bill. They increased the gas tax by 5 cents a gallon and indexed it to inflation. The deal also included a hike in the sales tax in the Twin Cities area and a new 50-cent fee on deliveries worth more than $100.

As part of the $9 billion plan, which dramatically increased transportation funding in the state, lawmakers also changed the rules on how highway money could be spent, requiring that expansion projects help the state achieve its goals of reducing greenhouse gas pollution.

The bill set aside money to fund a new Amtrak route connecting the Twin Cities and Duluth. That service would be in addition to the new Borealis line the state launched in May connecting Minneapolis to Chicago. The state is also considering extending commuter rail service between Minneapolis and St. Cloud.

The legislation also changed the offense of fare evasion aboard Metro Transit in Minneapolis and St. Paul from a misdemeanor to an administrative citation like a parking ticket. It contained credits for the purchase of electric bikes and more funding for light rail.

Observers see transportation and infrastructure as a key policy area for Harris.

“If I was on the Harris team, I would want to start highlighting it,” Greg Regan, the president of the Transportation Trades Department of the AFL-CIO, recently told Route Fifty. “Their administration passed the largest investment in transportation in the history of our country: the biggest investment in transit, the biggest investment in passenger rail since the creation of Amtrak, the biggest investment in airports and roads. The infrastructure law is a really big deal.”