Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) acknowledged his confusion that the American people did not accept his and Kamala Harris’s vision for America, after a historic Election Day shellacking in which Donald Trump won the electoral college and the popular vote.
In a post-election loss speech Walz touted as offering a plan for “our path forward,” the governor called to bring down the temperature while taking multiple shots at Trump.
“It’s hard to understand why so many of our fellow citizens, people that we have fought so long and hard for, wound up choosing the other path,” Walz pondered aloud. “It’s hard to reckon with what that path looks like over the next four years.”
Walz professed to what voters cared about despite the American people overwhelmingly choosing Trump’s plan to deliver on those issues.
“What struck me everywhere I went without exception, people really wanted the same basic things” he said, citing “meaningful work, safe neighborhoods, good schools, affordable quality health care” as well as “security.”
Walz expressed little magnanimity towards Trump, touting his own resumé in Minnesota,even as Trump made major gains in the blue state. He claimed he delivered for the people on those issues “by standing up for our shared values and rejecting hatred and bigotry,” throwing further shade at Trump by proudly saying he “fought for everyone’s right to participate fully in our democracy” and “refused to scapegoat immigrants in this state.”
He discussed “our path forward,” while fear mongering on the agenda of the Trump administration.
“I know there’s a lot of folks that are worried about the next four years and what they’re going to look like,” he said. “I’m one of them. The agenda we heard from the other side in this campaign was very different from the one we know is right for our state and our country.”
He continued, warning “We’ve already seen the damage a president can cause when he’s in it for himself, not the American people. Look, we know what’s coming down the pipe. We know it because they told us, and we’re going to have to be ready to defend the progress that we’ve made here in Minnesota.”
Walz promised “the moment they try and bring a hateful agenda in this state, I’m going to stand ready to stand up and fight for the way we do things here.”
He then made a series of promises on issues that contributed to his and Harris’s loss. He said, “as long as I am governor of Minnesota” the state “will welcome immigrants with gratitude for their contributions to our communities, … stand with the rest of the world in fighting climate change,” … and “be a state that respects democracy, a place where we’re proud of our civic debate and where we don’t demonize people who disagree with us.”
Walz closed by telling the crowd that the time was not right to harshly judge the victors.
“I think sometimes we can be quick to judge people who don’t agree with us, to assume that they act out of cruelty or fear or self interest,” he said. “I don’t think that kind of judgment is helpful right now, and I don’t think it’s right. I think we ought to swallow – and this is me in this, as I’m speaking about myself – swallow a little bit of pride and look a little harder to find common ground with our neighbors who didn’t vote like we did in this election.”
Bradley Jaye is a Capitol Hill Correspondent for Breitbart News. Follow him on X/Twitter at @BradleyAJaye.