Vice presidential nominee Tim Walz and former President Bill Clinton headlined day three of the Democratic National Convention. The event is party's choreographed rollout of a new candidate, Kamala Harris, and her pitch to voters. Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg also addressed the convention. Harris is working to stitch together a broad coalition in her bid to defeat Republican former President Donald Trump this fall. The crowd also heard from Republicans with the message of “quit Trump.” That included a Republican voter from Alabama.
The Democrats are making a play for disaffected Trump voters — and they used one of his former White House staffers to make their case Tuesday night. Stephanie Grisham worked in various roles in the Trump White House, including communications director and press secretary, allowing Democrats to argue that those who know Trump best have seen him at his worst. "He has no empathy, no morals, and no fidelity to the truth," Grisham said. "I couldn't be part of the insanity any longer." Kyle Sweetser, a Trump voter from Alabama, told the convention the former president's tariffs made life harder for construction workers like him.
Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg also addressed the convention. As Tim Walz wrapped his speech, accepting the vice presidential nomination, to wild applause, his walk-off song "Rockin' in the Free World" played. The classic rock fan selected the song, according to a campaign aide, and rocker Neil Young signed off on its use. Young previously sued Trump for using the song at his campaign rallies without permission.
Walz, a former football coach, gave Democrats a "pep talk" in his remarks, saying, "Let me finish with this, team. It's the fourth quarter. We're down a field goal. But we're on offense and we've got the ball." He said they have to do the "blocking and tackling," making phone calls and knocking on doors over the next 76 days. "There will be time to sleep when you're dead," he says.
Walz touched on he and his wife's struggle with infertility
"If you've never experienced infertility, I guarantee you know someone who has." His son Gus began crying in the crowd in response.
In introducing himself to voters as Harris' running mate, Walz has made his family's struggle with fertility a central part of his narrative, a tangible way to connect with voters alarmed at the erosion of reproductive rights in the U.S. But Gwen Walz on Tuesday issued a statement that detailed the experience more comprehensively and disclosed that they relied on a different process known as intrauterine insemination, or IUI.
Minnesota Governor Tim Walz has cultivated a "happy warrior" political persona. But he's not the first Democratic vice presidential nominee from Minnesota to do so. That honor would go to Hubert Humphrey, Lyndon Johnson's vice president, who channeled his Midwestern earnestness into becoming a foil for Republican presidential nominee Barry Goldwater during the 1964 campaign.
It's a role Humphrey relished, once taunting the arch-conservative Goldwater as someone who "wouldn't vote yes for Mother's Day." Humphrey was also quite effective, repeatedly drawing attacks from Goldwater — while diverting them away from Johnson.
Walz, who exudes "dad" vibes and Midwestern politeness, is no slouch himself. He coined one of the buzziest phrases of the campaign, "weird," which helped elevate him from political unknown to the position he now holds. He began his speech by talking about his small-town upbringing in Butte, Nebraska, where not everyone believed the same thing or loved the same way, but says, "Everybody belongs, and everybody has a responsibility to contribute."
Walz went through his professional resuming, starting with his work as a high school teacher and coach. "It was those players and my students who inspired me to run for Congress," he said. "I learned how to work across the aisle on issues like growing the rural economies and taking care of veterans."
Walz said, "Never underestimate a public school teacher," as he described how he won a seat in Congress after a career as a teacher with no prior political experience. The sentiment shared by the speakers who are previewed Tim Walz at the DNC could be summed up with a single phrase: Midwest is best. That oft-repeated phrase in the central U.S. is a key element of his biography.
