As Vice President Kamala Harris works to introduce a running mate who is not well-known at a national level, elected officials in Connecticut say they know Tim Walz well, touting their personal and working relationships that they built while he was in Congress and now as a governor.
Democrats across Connecticut and the country are trying to sustain the momentum behind Harris with fewer than 100 days to go until the November election. She formally clinched the presidential nomination in a virtual roll call vote a night earlier, and on Tuesday, she announced the Minnesota governor as her vice presidential pick.
It was the first time elected officials in the state held a formal political event focused on Harris — and now her new running mate — since President Joe Biden dropped out and endorsed her. Connecticut Democrats quickly followed suit and rallied behind her. Harris has raised massive amounts of money in recent weeks and consolidated support, but she is running a campaign on an accelerated timeline.
The event in Hartford, which drew a crowd of more than 50 people, sought to illustrate the unity of Connecticut’s Democratic Party. The lineup of speakers included Gov. Ned Lamont, Lt. Gov. Susan Bysiewicz, state Treasurer Erick Russell, state Comptroller Sean Scanlon, U.S. Rep. John Larson, D-1st District; U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District; U.S. Rep. Jahana Hayes, D-5th District; and U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn.
To drive that point home, they held their event in front of a mural of the vice president alongside former first lady Michelle Obama, former Connecticut Gov. Ella Grasso and Supreme Court Justices Sonia Sotomayor and the late Ruth Bader Ginsberg.
While Harris’ pick was announced only hours before the event, Lamont was already sporting a Harris-Walz T-shirt. The back read “say it to my face,” referencing Harris’ retort at a recent rally in Atlanta about former President Donald Trump waffling on whether to debate her in September.
“Barack Obama was famously the guy who used to say to crowds, ‘fired up, ready to go.’ And I have not seen a Democratic party more fired up and ready to go than I’ve seen in the last few days, because we know what is at stake in this election,” Scanlon said.
The choice for Harris’ running mate reportedly came down to Walz and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro as finalists.
Walz is a former congressman from Minnesota who served in the National Guard and formerly worked as a teacher before he got into politics. While Democrats have been able to carry Minnesota in presidential elections, Walz was seen as a pick that could potentially shore up more support in nearby swing states in the Midwest.
Connecticut Democrats praised Walz as “authentic” and “straight talking” and highlighted his work in Minnesota, specifically for signing into law free school meals for children regardless of their family’s income. While his name ID is not as high as others who were considered for the job, they believe he bolsters Democrats’ chances in Midwest swing states and can bring new voters into the party.
Courtney was one of the few Connecticut Democrats to publicly endorse a vice presidential contender. He pushed for Walz, who was elected to Congress the same year as Courtney, after they both flipped competitive districts in 2006. They worked together for more than a decade, which included their time on the House Armed Services Committee.
In the days leading up to the announcement, Courtney said he made a call to Cedric Richmond, a former U.S. congressman who served as a co-chair to Biden’s reelection campaign, in support of Walz. Courtney said Richmond was receptive, noting that Walz had a “congressional network of friends.”
“We had that shared experience running in a district, which was not sort of your typical profile, and somebody who mastered that because of who he is,” Courtney said. “He brings so much to this ticket, and the fact that Vice President Harris recognized that, sort of stepped out of the conventional sort of process that normally dominates in Washington … is just another reason why she is the right person to lead this country to victory in 2024.”
Lamont has also worked closely with Walz, who serves as chair of the Democratic Governors Association. Both Walz and Lamont participated in a White House meeting last month as Democratic governors discussed the future of Biden’s candidacy. Walz left that meeting saying he believed Biden was “fit for office.” In the days before Biden dropped out, Lamont more subtly hinted that the president should exit the race.
Lamont declined to comment if he pushed for Walz behind the scenes.
“You go to these governors meetings, and they can be a little dry sometimes. Not if you sit next to Tim Walz. This guy just makes you chuckle,” Lamont said. “I love sitting next to Tim Walz. That’s some of the magic that man has.”
Harris’ choice of a running mate comes a few weeks after Trump named U.S. Sen. JD Vance of Ohio to run on the ticket with him this fall.
As Vance made his debut at Republicans’ nominating convention in Milwaukee last month, Connecticut Republicans were hopeful about Vance making the case for Trump.
In the weeks since he joined the Trump ticket, Vance has gotten backlash for past comments he has made about childless Americans, who he argues should pay higher taxes and should get less voting power than parents.
Trump downplayed the significance of running mates in a combative interview at the National Association of Black Journalists’ convention last week.
“I will say this, and I think this is well documented, historically, the vice president in terms of the election does not have any impact,” Trump said last week. “I mean virtually no impact.”
Republicans, meanwhile, have sought to cast Walz as a “dangerously liberal extremist.”
“In short, the Harris-Walz far-left radical team wants to destroy the very fabric of America and take America and Americans to a place our founding fathers fought to get away from. Americans have a choice,” Connecticut Republican Party chairman Ben Proto said.
“During the riots in Minneapolis following the death of George Floyd, Gov. Walz refused to call in the National Guard while the Twin Cities burned and, at the same time, then-Senator Harris called on people to provide bail money for the rioters. If ever a Presidential and Vice-Presidential nominee were connected at the hip, it’s the Harris-Walz team,” he added.
The Trump campaign echoed a similar sentiment, arguing that Walz is using California policies as a model for Minnesota. As a native of California, Harris previously represented the state in the U.S. Senate and served as state attorney general and a district attorney in San Francisco.
“It’s no surprise that San Francisco Liberal Kamala Harris wants West Coast wannabe Tim Walz as her running-mate — Walz has spent his governorship trying to reshape Minnesota in the image of the Golden State,” Karoline Leavitt, Trump campaign press secretary, said in a statement.
“From proposing his own carbon-free agenda, to suggesting stricter emission standards for gas-powered cars, and embracing policies to allow convicted felons to vote, Walz is obsessed with spreading California’s dangerously liberal agenda far and wide,” she added.
But Connecticut Democrats on Tuesday defended his record on abortion rights, school meals and the passage of a police reform bill in the wake of Floyd’s murder in 2020.
“If the metric for being too far left is feeding children and protecting women’s reproductive health and protecting labor and LGBTQ rights and making sure we have stronger gun safety legislation, then I think that’s just about the right place for me and most of the people in this state,” Hayes said.
“I don’t think he’s too far left,” she continued. “What I do think though is that a Trump-JD Vance ticket is too far right for anybody, even Republicans.”
Lamont said he sees a lot of himself in Walz’s tenure as governor and the alignment on policy between Connecticut and Minnesota — a $15 minimum wage, paid family and medical leave and reproductive care.
“They accuse him of being too liberal. They accuse me of being too moderate,” Lamont said. “I think he’s got it about right.”
The Connecticut Mirror/Connecticut Public Radio federal policy reporter position is made possible, in part, by funding from the Robert and Margaret Patricelli Family Foundation.
This story was originally published by the Connecticut Mirror.
