US election campaign: Tim who? Kamala Harris and her new vice president

Kamala Harris’ words are drowned out by the noise several times. Thousands of spectators around the 59-year-old cheer, clap and applaud. Her supporters repeatedly start chanting. The Democratic US presidential candidate is beaming. The man diagonally behind her is beaming even more: Tim Walz.

Until recently, only a few people outside of his state knew the governor of Minnesota. But on this evening he is the big star. Harris introduces the 60-year-old as her new vice presidential candidate in a sports stadium in Philadelphia. Walz listens with a broad grin, repeatedly touches his heart with his hand, folds his hands in a gesture of thanks, and makes several bows.

In a shirt-sleeve way

Then he delivers what Harris hired him to do: straight-forward messages with a down-to-earth Midwestern twist. Walz says of Harris’ Republican opponent Donald Trump, for example, that the crime rate in the USA has risen during his time in office, “and that doesn’t even include the crimes he himself committed.” The crowd cheers.

He thanked Harris for “bringing the joy back.” In fact, the Democrats haven’t been in such a good mood for a long time. And the party is making a concerted effort to approach its election campaign with a new lightness.

Until Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race, the mood among Democrats was gloomy – alternating between hopelessness, resignation and sheer despair. Now Biden is gone, Harris is here – and the base feels a sense of optimism.

New “energy” and “enthusiasm”

“Until Biden dropped out, the mood was really low,” says Ken Grimes, who came to the rally from a suburb of Philadelphia. “Now it’s different. Everyone is excited.” The mere prospect that the presidential race no longer seems completely lost has sent the party into raptures within a matter of weeks. It is completely unclear whether Harris will actually be able to prevail against Trump in the end. The fact that the race against a convicted criminal who has been surrounded by scandals for years is so close should give the Democrats pause for thought.

But the people at the rally don’t want to hear any of that. They are glad that they have put the recent Biden crisis behind them and are raving about new “energy” and “enthusiasm” in the party – men, women, young, old, black, white alike. Suddenly the race is open again, they say, and there is a chance that in the end it will not be Trump who moves into the White House, but Harris – as the first woman in the country’s history, and the first black woman at that.

Harris is already a pioneer in the vice presidency in both respects. She is more popular with black voters, women and young people than Trump. There are a striking number of women in the audience at the rally in Philadelphia. But the former prosecutor from the west coast state of California is having a harder time with male, white, working-class voters. And that is exactly where Walz is supposed to help – even if some viewers in Philadelphia admit that until recently they didn’t even know he existed.

Balance for Harris

The Democrat grew up in the country, in a small town in the state of Nebraska, was in the military, served in the National Guard, later became a teacher and football coach before entering politics, first as a member of the House of Representatives, and since 2019 he has been governor of Minnesota. Walz has a far less glamorous resume than others who were considered for the vice presidential post. He does not come from one of the swing states, the most contested and potentially decisive states, and is hardly known on the national stage. But he brings a lot of what Harris urgently needs.

Walz is a white man from the Midwest who grew up in modest circumstances, is down-to-earth, pragmatic, someone who likes to hunt and has his own guns. At the same time, he is someone with liberal views who supports abortion rights and free meals for schoolchildren. He has support primarily in the left wing of the party. Trump rants that they are the “most radical left-wing duo in American history.” In fact, however, the combination of Harris and Walz could be too liberal for some in the Democratic base.

In the coming days, the two will be making a blitz campaign tour through all the swing states. The stop in Philadelphia in the state of Pennsylvania is the start. As a contrast program, Trump is sending his vice president JD Vance to all of those places in parallel to the Democratic duo.

Walz versus Vance

Walz is for Harris what Trump had in mind for Vance: a partner who grew up in humble circumstances in the countryside – a link to the working class and those who are just barely making ends meet. But unlike Walz, Vance did not later become a teacher and football coach, but a financial investor with a law degree from the elite American university Yale.

Walz also uses this against him and mocks him in Philadelphia: “Like all normal people I grew up with in the heartland, JD studied at Yale, had his career financed by billionaires and then wrote a bestseller in which he slams the people in his hometown.” Again, there was jeering in the hall.

The new tactic against Trump

Walz has shaped the new strategy of not taking Trump and Vance too seriously. In his campaign appearances, Trump always indulges in horror scenarios of the downfall of the country under the leadership of “left-wing radical” Democrats like Harris – and now Walz too. They wanted to destroy the USA, stand by and watch an invasion of criminal migrants and lead the United States into a third world war.

For a long time, the Democrats under Biden also relied on dire warnings that Trump was an existential threat to democracy and peace in the world. But with Walz, there was a turnaround.

Over the past few weeks, the unassuming man from Minnesota has gradually changed the way the entire party talks about Trump. Walz invented the term “weird” for the ex-president. Walz started using it in an interview, and gradually all the prominent figures in the party took up the slogan. Walz is also running his campaign slogan in Philadelphia, saying of Trump and Vance: “These guys are scary, and yes, they are damn strange.”

It has now become a battle cry that echoes through the hall: “He is a weirdo,” the crowd yells about Trump. Not being taken seriously is something Trump is likely to particularly dislike. And it is an attack that is difficult to counter. With Walz, there will probably be even more of them from now on.