WASHINGTON DC, Sep 6 — Not very many voters were aware of Minnesota Governor Tim Walz until Kamala Harris tapped him to be her running mate as she seeks to become America’s 47th president. As Newsweek put it, “since Walz was announced as Kamala Harris’ running mate, critics have scrutinized his military record and alleged that he has made misleading statements about his service with the National Guard. Figures including GOP vice presidential nominee JD Vance have also accused Walz of ‘stolen valor’ for calling himself a retired Command Sergeant Major.”
One “critic,” Lisa Zarza, a Minnesota business owner, told the Association of Mature American Citizens’ Better For America podcast that she was “personally afflicted by the anti-American governing policies of Tim Walz. He destroyed our lives.” His COVID lockdowns were so strict that I wound up bankrupt, she said.
When it was revealed that Tim Walz, would be running for the vice presidency, Lisa said, “I was speechless. Didn’t they do their research? I believed that there was no chance in hell that he was going to get it. This is probably one of the scariest elections our nation has ever seen because the sides are so divided and I can’t see a middle ground that would make anyone happy. I’m glad [Robert F.] Kennedy decided to support Trump because I really think that he might be the middle ground that our country needs at this point.”
Noting that many polls show President Trump in position to become the first Republican to win Minnesota since Richard Nixon, Lisa said “I’m hoping, but we also have to look back two years ago when Governor Walz won the last governor’s race. I was dumbfounded. And, I think it maybe I didn’t have a lot to do with him. I did have a lot to do with who he was running against. So I’m hoping that the numbers that we saw on the last gubernatorial election isn’t indicative of what our state represents, which is we don’t want Walz there. But more people felt stronger about the abortion issue than they did about Tim Walz. And I’m really hoping that that being a non-issue right now in this election that we’re going to see the numbers where they really should be.”
Lisa added that “I’m glad Kennedy decided to support Trump because I really think that he might be the middle ground that our country needs at this point. It’s okay if you’re a Democrat. I think Republicans and Democrats are so far apart right not that there’s no middle ground and we have to get to that middle ground because we’re Americans, we have to become united again.”
John Grimaldi served on the first non-partisan communications department in the New York State Assembly and is a founding member of the Board of Directors of Priva Technologies, Inc. He has served for more than thirty years as a Trustee of Daytop Village Foundation, which oversees a worldwide drug rehabilitation network.