Gov. Tim Walz, D-Minn., was largely unknown to voters across the country when Vice President Kamala Harris selected him as her running mate, so his record is coming under national scrutiny for the first time. Unfortunately for Walz and the Democrats, his record as governor of Minnesota is every bit as bad as that of the Biden-Harris administration, if not worse.
When the George Floyd riots began in Minneapolis in May 2020, Walz dithered. For four days, while Minneapolis and other cities burned, Walz refused to call out the National Guard. By the time the riots were finally brought under control, the Minneapolis Police Department’s Third Precinct station had been stormed by rioters and burned, along with many other buildings.
The result is a crime wave that continues to the present. Throughout its history, Minnesota had always been a low-crime state. But as a result of Walz’s anti-law enforcement policies, the rate of serious crimes in Minnesota now exceeds the national average. For the first time, Minnesota is officially a high-crime state.
Walz’s tenure has been equally destructive of Minnesota’s economy. Historically, Minnesota has been a relatively high-income state. Its per capita gross domestic product has always been higher than the national average. But that, too, is no longer true. Walz’s anti-business and anti-growth policies have taken their toll, so that beginning in 2023, Minnesota’s per capita GDP is below the national average. Walz has performed the remarkable feat of making Minnesota an economically below-average state.
Students Suffer
For many years, Minnesotans have believed that their public schools and students — like those of the fictional Lake Wobegon — are above average. That was true once, but not under Walz. The Walz administration has driven an explosion in spending on K-12 schools, but more spending has not meant better results. On the contrary, student performance has plummeted.
Currently, fewer than half of all K-12 students in Minnesota’s public schools can either read or do math at grade level. Shockingly, 64 percent of Minnesota’s 11th graders can’t do math at grade level. And in the most recent testing, both 4th and 8th grade reading proficiency is the lowest ever recorded. Some of this decline is due to Walz’s improvident closing of Minnesota’s schools during the Covid epidemic, but dismal test results continue to the present.
Costly Energy Policy
Walz is an admirer of California. He has never seen a left-wing California initiative that he hasn’t tried to import into Minnesota. Thus, he has been a strong advocate for wind and solar energy. He authored a proposal to require 100 percent of Minnesota’s electricity to come from wind and solar by 2040. Remarkably, there was no cost estimate for this plan, nor was there a feasibility study to show that it could be done. Energy experts at the Center of the American Experiment estimated the cost of Walz’s plan at $313 billion, a price that still could not assure reliable power. Nevertheless, Walz was able to get that legislation passed, and he signed it into law.
Because of Walz’s “green” initiatives, the cost of electricity in Minnesota has risen much faster than the national average. Minnesota has lost the competitive advantage of cheaper-than-average electricity. This no doubt contributes to Minnesota’s subpar economic growth.
Scandal and Population Loss
Walz’s administration has also been plagued by scandal. Most notoriously, $250 million was stolen from taxpayers in the Feeding Our Future scandal. The money supposedly went to feed poor children, but the meals for which the money was paid were almost entirely fictitious. Confronted with the facts, Walz lied, asserting falsely that his Department of Education had been required by court order to make the payments. That claim was so outrageous that the court took the remarkable step of issuing a public statement refuting it.
The acid test of policies in any state is, are people moving in or out? Sadly, Minnesota, which once was a magnet, now repels residents. Every year Minnesota suffers a net outflow of residents to other states. Minnesota loses residents in every age bracket, and in every income category above $50,000. (The only income bracket where Minnesota gains residents, on net, is 0 to $25,000.) Under Walz’s leadership, Minnesota has joined California, New York, and Illinois as a state that many people want to leave, and few want to move into.
So on policy, Walz’s record is one of failure. That being the case, what does he bring to the Democratic ticket?
Offending Rural Voters and Veterans
Democrats seem to think that Walz will appeal to swing voters in rural areas because he is a veteran and from a small town. They may be in for a rude awakening: Walz is despised in rural Minnesota, where he was routed in his re-election race in 2022. This is partly because he has been openly contemptuous of rural voters. He was famously caught on video telling fellow Democrats that they shouldn’t worry about those broad red swaths on the map, because rural areas are “mostly rocks and cows.” Thousands of small-town Minnesotans formed a group called Rocks and Cows of Minnesota, which sold merchandise and erected anti-Walz billboards.
As for being a veteran, Walz did serve in the Minnesota National Guard for 24 years, rising to a high rank. But when the Minnesota Guard was ordered to Iraq in 2005, rather than being deployed, Walz quit. Many of his fellow guardsmen are still bitter at what they regard as a betrayal.
Social Issues
Walz is hard left on bread and butter issues, but it is the social issues where he is most extreme. He advocated for and signed legislation that legalizes abortion up to the moment of birth, as well as a law that makes Minnesota a “trans refuge” state where minors can obtain transgender surgeries that would be illegal where they live. Walz actually suggested that Minnesota can reverse its current outflow of residents by being the state people come to for abortions and transgender operations.
Walz has defended stocking public school libraries with books that include graphic depictions of gay sex. He signed a law requiring tampon dispensers in all boys’ bathrooms in the public schools. More seriously, he backed and signed a law that will require every class in every Minnesota public school to include an “ethnic studies” component that incorporates critical race theory and is openly anti-American.
Walz’s record does not commend him as a candidate for national office, and his views are sufficiently out of the mainstream that Democrats can only hope they do not become widely known. No doubt, the national press will do its best to try to keep them quiet.
John Hinderaker is the president of Center of the American Experiment and a co-founder of the Power Line website.
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