CHICAGO — In his first major address to voters Wednesday, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz forcefully declared that he and Vice President Kamala Harris “have an obligation to the American people to detail the policies we will implement,” even though Harris’ campaign website still lacks a policy page.
“Before we ask the American people to vote for us, I think we have an obligation to tell them exactly what she would do if she were president,” Walz, 60, said in a speech at the Democratic National Convention.
Both have faced persistent criticism from Republicans for not clearly laying out what policies voters can expect under a Harris-Waltz administration.
The vice presidential nominee then vaguely outlined the four policies, offering few details about how he would achieve them.
“So here’s the point: Cut it out, save it, send it to your relatives who haven’t decided yet and let them know that if you’re a middle-class family or a family trying to get into the middle class, Kamala Harris is going to cut your taxes,” he argued.
“If you’re struggling with the price of prescription drugs, Kamala Harris will stand up to Big Pharma. If you’re looking to buy a home, Kamala Harris will help make it more affordable.”
“And no matter who you are, Kamala Harris is going to stand up and fight for your freedom to live the life you want, because that’s what we want for ourselves and that’s what we want for our neighbors.”
Republican candidate Donald Trump’s campaign rally Fake policy page The Democratic candidate drew attention to the lack of a policy page on her website, where Harris’ team would have listed some of her most controversial past positions.
Trump’s team noted that Harris, 59, had previously supported policies to end private health insurance and touted her role in leading President Biden’s drive to reduce illegal immigration, which broke records each year of his administration’s first three years.
The Democratic Party’s official platform was drafted last month before Biden, 81, dropped out of the race on July 21 and endorsed Harris, and party representatives approved it this week without updating it to include recent policies mentioned by Harris, such as a controversial plan to impose price controls on food.
In a sign of its anachronism, the party platform mentions Biden’s second term 21 times.
Trump’s allies argue that Harris is a political “chameleon” who changes policy positions on key issues, making it difficult for voters to know what they’ll get under her administration.
Walz, meanwhile, delivered an energetic 15-minute speech in which he highlighted his humble upbringing and his journey from being a high school social studies teacher and football coach to serving in Congress and then as governor.
“I grew up in Butte, Nebraska, a town of 400 people. I was in a high school class of 24 kids and not one of us went to Yale,” he said, mocking Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance, who graduated from Ohio State and went on to Yale Law School.
“But when you grow up in a small town like this, you learn to look out for each other. Everybody belongs. And everybody has a responsibility to contribute.”
Walz took the stage after being introduced by a former student who recalled the vice presidential candidate pushing a car that got stuck in the snow, and by members of his former football team, which he led to a state championship.
“It was my players and students who inspired me to run for Congress. They saw in me what I wanted to instill in them: a commitment to the common good, an understanding that we are all in the same boat and a belief that one person can truly make a difference for their neighbor,” he said.
“I was a high school teacher in my 40s with small children, no political experience, no money, campaigning in a deep red district. But you should never underestimate a public school teacher.”
Walz described himself as a gun owner and expert shooter, saying he has the “trophies to prove it” from congressional shooting contests, and said he has “learned how to compromise without compromising my values.”
Vance notably avoided controversy over false public statements about his service in the National Guard, including saying he served in the war, which Vance, an Ohio senator who deployed to Iraq, denounced as “honor theft.”
“I enlisted two days after my 17th birthday and have proudly served in the uniform of my country for 24 years,” Walz said in a speech marking the end of his military service.
“The GI Bill made it possible for my father and I to go to college.”
Walz has also come under fire for falsely saying the first of his two children was conceived through in vitro fertilization, a procedure that involves harvesting eggs and creating embryos that is threatened in some states by religious conservatives who believe the procedure can destroy human lives.
The couple actually conceived through artificial insemination, his wife, Gwen, revealed on Tuesday.
“This is a personal issue for Gwen and me,” Waltz said onstage, alluding to the issue when he vowed to defend “IVF fertility treatments.”
“Even if you’ve never been through the hell of infertility, I’m sure you know someone who has. I remember praying every night for a call, the sickness in the pit of my stomach when the phone rang, and the extreme pain of hearing that the treatment wasn’t working,” he said.
“It took Gwen and I many years, but we were able to undergo fertility treatments and when our daughter was born we named her Hope.”
He added: “I’m going to tell you how we started our family because it touches on a big theme in this election: freedom.”
The vice presidential candidate also touted his record as governor.
“We’ve cut taxes for the middle class. We’ve passed paid family and sick leave. We’ve invested in fighting crime and making housing affordable,” said Governor Walz.
“We cut the cost of prescription drugs and saved people from the kind of medical debt that devastated my family. And we made sure every child in our state had breakfast and lunch every day. While other states were banning books from their schools, we were taking hunger out of our schools.”
He then slammed Trump and Vance, saying, “Some people don’t understand what it takes to be a good neighbor. Look at Donald Trump and J.D. Vance.”
He insisted that the Trump administration would implement controversial provisions of “Project 2025,” a plan drafted by conservative activists, despite President Trump’s denial of the plan to allies.
“I’ve coached hype school football for a long time, so I know and trust that if someone takes the time to write a playbook, they’re going to execute it,” he said.
“When I was a teacher, we elected a student body president every year, and those teenagers could teach Donald Trump an awful lot about what it means to be a leader,” Waltz continued.
“Leaders don’t insult people and blame others all day long. Leaders do their job. So, I don’t know about you guys, but I’m ready to turn the page on these guys.”
