‘I think it’s plausible:’ Is Gov. Walz a dark horse in the VP race?

[MUSIC PLAYING] CATHY WURZER: It's been a whirlwind of a week in politics, and that is an understatement. It's carried Minnesota Governor Tim Walz onto the national stage with appearances on the PBS News Hour, MSNBC, Fox News, and a number of other news outlets. It could be part of an audition of sorts. He is one of the people being considered as a potential running mate for Vice President Kamala Harris.

A few prominent Minnesota Democrats have thrown their support to Walz for a higher office. Minnesota DFL member of Congress Angie Craig posted on X that she is, quote, "all in" on Governor Walz for VP. And Dean Phillips was asked about Walz's potential this morning on CNN.

DEAN PHILLIPS: I think Governor Walz would be an exceptional vice president, a great messenger. He's got executive experience, legislative experience. He's a teacher, a national guardsman, the whole package. He, Josh Shapiro, Andy Beshear-- I think we've got some wonderful governors ready to lead. And it's a new day rising.

CATHY WURZER: By most accounts, Walz is not on the Harris campaign's short list, and his national profile is arguably not as large as contenders like Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper, or Arizona Senator Mark Kelly.

So we wanted to get some perspective from someone closer to Washington, but who knows Minnesota. Aaron Blake is that perfect person. Aaron is a senior political reporter for The Washington Post, where he writes for The Fix and co-hosts the podcast The Campaign Moment. He's also a University of Minnesota grad who covered politics for the Star Tribune. Oh, Aaron Blake, how have you been?

AARON BLAKE: I'm doing well, Cathy. It's really good to get a chance to talk to you. It's been a little while, I think.

CATHY WURZER: It's been a little while. Well, we had the chance to talk with Governor Walz earlier this week, where he certainly did not rule out interest in being on the ticket. When his name surfaced as a potential vice presidential candidate, what did you think?

AARON BLAKE: It's hard for me to see-- we always talk about the history of Minnesotans who have run for president, and it hasn't always gone terribly well. But we are kind of the state of vice presidents. We had Hubert Humphrey, we had Walter Mondale.

I think that Governor Walz makes a lot of sense, in a way that some of these other candidates who have been mentioned make sense. And so I think it's plausible. I don't think it's necessarily the pick you go with if you're really trying to get people super excited and have a known quantity out there. But it is something that could fit in pretty well with Kamala Harris as the nominee. And so I think it's a plausible possibility right now.

CATHY WURZER: On your podcast, you have Governor Walz as a bit of a dark horse candidate. I think he was number seven on your list of seven. What about Walz might make him a good choice as a running mate for Kamala Harris?

AARON BLAKE: Yeah, so, we tend to look in these processes at people who come from swing states. Does Kamala Harris want to really win Pennsylvania? So maybe she picks Josh Shapiro. Does she really want to win Michigan? So she picks Gretchen Whitmer, Arizona with Mark Kelly. There's some very good options if that's the name of the game.

But I think a lot of times, what you see is tickets value more kind of a broader appeal. So who is the candidate that can not just appeal to Pennsylvania, but more broadly, in some of these Midwestern states, or just kind of has an appeal that's going to work in a lot of different states.

And I think Tim Walz is somebody who, because he comes from a more rural part of the state, because he's kind of got an affable manner about him, because he's a former school teacher and military veteran, these are the kinds of things that fit pretty well, especially as a running mate on a ticket with a former senator from California.

And so I think that if you're looking for somebody who expands the base of the Democratic Party or maybe can speak to things in a way that Kamala Harris can't, Tim Walz makes sense alongside some of these other candidates that we've been talking about.

CATHY WURZER: Yet he and the DFL legislatures have passed a pretty progressive agenda here in Minnesota. Is that a help or a hindrance, especially in some of those swing states?

AARON BLAKE: Yeah, it's a good question. I think that has been a story in Minnesota the last couple of years where it's a pretty tightly divided state legislature, but there have been a lot of progressive policies. I think when you look at the kinds of policies that have been passed, though, they're not ones that are necessarily unpopular with the American people. They're just ones that have been difficult to pass in similarly situated states.

So I don't necessarily see that as a downside. I think it's something that Walz could point to, to rally the base, even though he kind of would be looked to, to appeal more to the political middle. And so I think that's an interesting part of this calculus, because Minnesota has been more progressive than a lot of these other kind of swing states and more tightly divided states in recent years.

CATHY WURZER: What do you think Kamala Harris's choice might say about her policy priorities, if anything?

AARON BLAKE: Yeah, it's a good question because Kamala Harris, especially when she was running for president in 2020, in the Democratic primaries, kind of camped out on the left a lot. That was her lane, supposedly, in that primary. And so she took a lot of positions that she's going to have to account for during this campaign, talking about overhauling Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Some of her positions on health care reform were ones that were more embraced by the left-wing of the Democratic Party.

I don't necessarily think that we're going to see her embrace those now that she's a general election candidate so much. But having a running mate who is a little bit more pragmatic on those kinds of things, hasn't necessarily taken those positions, could send a signal to middle of the road voters that maybe the things that Republicans are saying about what Kamala Harris is really going to do aren't her actual priorities.

CATHY WURZER: Say, I'm wondering where you are in Washington as you watch this. Those who are helping the Harris campaign vet these potential VP candidates, I mean, they got to really pick them up and lay them down here. What do you think's going on behind closed doors? I mean, how much of a tension-filled effort is this?

AARON BLAKE: Yeah, it's a big question because this is a very truncated process. Usually, you have the primaries, and they're wrapped up by March or maybe April. And you've got three or four months to figure out who your running mate is. They really had to do this in about two weeks.

And so, I think that creates a premium on candidates who have been vetted before, have faced tough races where any kind of problems might have come up in those races. And then I think it also just kind of creates a premium on somebody who you feel really comfortable with. Like, Sarah Palin in 2008 was an outside the box pick. It didn't really work out very well.

I think that the name of the game here for the Harris campaign is to pick somebody who they feel the most secure with, who they think is going to hit the ground running with them. And so I think that's going to be a focus of who this choice ultimately is.

CATHY WURZER: Is that somebody like a Senator Mark Kelly from Arizona? He has been vetted. He's been tested.

AARON BLAKE: Yeah, a lot of these candidates that we're talking about here have been kind of talked about as maybe a 2028 candidate. They might be a little bit newer to higher profile roles like Josh Shapiro, who was only elected governor in 2022, so pretty recently. So it is a big step up.

And not a lot of these candidates have been out there in Iowa delivering remarks about potentially running for president one day or giving these national media interviews, like we've seen from Governor Walz in recent days. So it is a different thing. And it's a different stage to be on.

And so, sometimes that step up goes smoothly, and sometimes it doesn't go so smoothly. And really, I think that's why you're seeing a lot of candidates like Walz go out there and give all these interviews. They're kind of auditioning for the role in certain ways. And so if I'm the Harris campaign, I'm looking at these interviews and looking at how they might conduct themselves in that role moving forward.

CATHY WURZER: And how has he been doing, in your estimation?

AARON BLAKE: The one thing that's really been interesting to me is he's been emphasizing the rural roots. He's been talking about being a school teacher. Like, in some ways, it's the job is to attack the Republican ticket and play up Kamala Harris's assets. But Walz has kind of been making the case for himself, and you've got to slip that in a little bit as well. So I think that's kind of a preview of maybe how he would talk about himself if he were the pick and I think maybe telling about his interest in this job.

CATHY WURZER: So when do you think we're going to find out? Is it before August 7? Right?

AARON BLAKE: Yeah, so there's been a little bit of wiggle room on that. The Democratic Party has said they want to have their ticket finalized by August 7. They've said that's important for ballot access reasons, which are more complicated than I think I need to get into right now. But they have left it open a little bit as to whether they need to have that VP. That is the goal. It's just a matter of how comfortable they are at that given point in time.

CATHY WURZER: OK. So when all is said and done, Aaron, would you be surprised if it was Tim Walz as the selection? I'd probably be a little bit more surprised if it were him than some of these other names we're talking about. But I wouldn't be hugely surprised. Minnesota is not the most important swing state anymore. It used to be.

But the Midwest and the Rust Belt more broadly is so key for the Democratic ticket. And if you want somebody who can kind of speak the language of voters in that area of the country, there are other options who are not Governor Walz, but he's certainly among them.

CATHY WURZER: And before you go, I mean, this has been an extraordinary run of political news for you and your team. How are you navigating all of this?

DEAN PHILLIPS: It's been remarkable. I was at the Republican convention in Milwaukee last week. I got home and got a little bit of rest. And then we had this huge news dropping on Sunday. As somebody who writes about this stuff constantly and for many months on end, it feels like we're starting to get this race crystallized a little bit more.

People are starting to pay attention in a way that they hadn't before. We had two very well-known candidates that people maybe didn't care to hear too much about before. And now I think it's starting to come into focus. We're starting to get a sense for what this election is really going to be about. And I think we're all hitting the ground running right now.

CATHY WURZER: You are, indeed. Aaron, always a pleasure. Thank you, and best of luck on the campaign trail. We'll be watching.

AARON BLAKE: Thank you, Cathy.

CATHY WURZER: Aaron Blake is a senior political reporter for The Washington Post.