After Minnesota primary, Democrats turn attention to Chicago for national convention

CATHY WURZER: OK, so the DNC starts Monday in Chicago. Since last week's edition of Governor Tim Walz to the Democratic ticket, there are many, many more eyes on the convention here in the State of Minnesota. Our politics reporters, Mark Zdechlik and Clay Masters, are gearing up to head to the convention. They join Brian and I in studio. I haven't been surrounded by this many individuals, human beings in my studio in years.

BRIAN BAKST: My team is working hard. Make sure the bosses know, OK?

CATHY WURZER: I will definitely. Hey, Clay.

CLAY MASTERS: Hey, how's it going?

CATHY WURZER: Great. Right now, Tim Walz should be somewhere in Denver, I think, for a fundraiser. He's on his first solo tour of the ticket, of the Harris ticket. Where has he been? Where is he going? What's he doing?

CLAY MASTERS: He's been everywhere, like that Johnny Cash song. He was in Philadelphia early on. He was in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. They're really trying to barnstorm all these big swing states that the winner of the general election really needs to take. That was the introduction phase that they went through.

And then Walz has been on this solo tour where he's been trying to drum up support. Yesterday, he was drumming up support for labor unions, talking about his credentials as being a part of a labor union as a teacher. And so he's going everywhere. He's even on Saturday, going to my home state in Nebraska.

BRIAN BAKST: You're from Nebraska?

CLAY MASTERS: That's right.

CATHY WURZER: I didn't know that.

CLAY MASTERS: He'll be there to try to get. Nebraska splits their delegation up and it's not a winner take all. Omaha went for Biden last time and it also went for Obama back in 2008. They're sending him everywhere, even to his home state.

CATHY WURZER: We can send, actually, Clay to Omaha quickly. There's a flight that goes from MSP to Omaha.

BRIAN BAKST: If he wasn't going to Chicago, he'd probably be going to Omaha.

CATHY WURZER: That's right. Mark, hey, what do you make of the week or so of a national introduction of Tim Walz?

MARK ZDECHLIK: I think he did very, very well in Philadelphia. I think this week we've seen a different Tim Walz. One of his big selling points is that he comes across as so authentic and so genuine. In the past, he's been calling the shots. That, Cathy, is no longer the case.

He has how many advisers, directly or indirectly, trying to shape what he looks like, what he sounds like? And I felt like that was a little bit evident yesterday during the speech, the big labor speech.

CATHY WURZER: He was talking to AFSCME I think.

MARK ZDECHLIK: Yeah. Yeah, he just felt a little bit canned. And I'm sure that's a struggle for him because he wants to do a good job. They like him because he's authentic. But they're also giving him marching orders to be authentic in a certain way. And that's a big challenge.

BRIAN BAKST: And, Clay, you're going to be watching Tim Walz closely in Chicago and all the dressing they put on to build him up ahead of this big speech next week. What types of voices should we expect to hear promoting Tim Walz?

CLAY MASTERS: I think you're going to hear a lot. First off, sure, we've been hearing about him nationally for the last couple of weeks, but this guy is still very relatively unknown, regardless of how much we seem to know about him, especially in the last couple of weeks.

But I think we're going to hear a lot of continuing to talk up his profile, continuing to talk about how he plays in maybe not the very rural places in the country, but maybe some of the larger micropolitans across the country. I think you're really going to see, it'll be interesting to see how they just play up his credentials, labor, teacher, all these different things.

BRIAN BAKST: And testimonials from former students, players.

CLAY MASTERS: Yeah, we're actually going to hear today. There's a group of students that he had in Mankato. They're going to be talking him up. We're going to continue to learn a lot more about the governor, who we all seem to know a lot about already.

CATHY WURZER: Say, can somebody help me here. What about the pro-Palestinian demonstrations expected at the convention? What do we know about that?

CLAY MASTERS: Yeah. Remember, the uncommitted delegation that's going, these were people who were protesting President Biden in how he was handling things in the Middle East. Minnesota sending the most uncommitted delegates, 11 of 93. They held a virtual roll call earlier this month where they said who they would be voting for. And they read the names of Palestinians who were killed in Gaza by Israeli forces.

And so the ballots that actually the delegates get, say, Kamala Harris or present. All of their votes get cast as present. They're going to be there. There's going to be protests outside the convention hall. And so there's still going to be a presence, but it's much smaller than the amount of folks who have committed to Kamala Harris.

CATHY WURZER: But Minnesota's delegation has, what, 11 uncommitted delegates?

CLAY MASTERS: Yeah, 11 of what? Like 93. So it's a small portion of the delegates going.

BRIAN BAKST: Mark, you went to the Republican National Convention last month in Milwaukee. We heard from senators, members of Donald Trump's family, past administration officials, even Hulk Hogan. We didn't hear from any former Republican presidents or past presidential nominees other than Trump. Was that striking?

MARK ZDECHLIK: In a way, it is. In the context of political conventions, typically, you have people that don't necessarily always agree with you on everything but are well-known to a party. The Republican Party right now is Donald Trump's party. And he invited who he wanted to speak at his convention.

And there wasn't dissent or even a way to, apart from the offer to Nikki Haley, there wasn't a big effort to start trying to reach out to different parts of what might be his coalition. It's striking, as far as tradition goes. But it's not surprising in the way that Donald Trump runs the Republican Party. It's his party.

BRIAN BAKST: And one of the reasons I ask is because Democrats are bringing out all the old White House luminaries next week. Who's speaking besides Kamala Harris and Tim Walz?

MARK ZDECHLIK: Well, it's a Democratic star-studded event, it'll be, in Chicago. On Monday, President Biden will speak. Hillary Clinton will also speak on Monday. On Tuesday, former President Barack Obama will be on stage and in televisions and on radios throughout the country. And on Wednesday, former President Bill Clinton will be there. It's quite a remarkable difference from the lineup that was at the RNC for Donald Trump's kind of coronation.

CATHY WURZER: And it looks like prior to the RNC this weekend--

BRIAN BAKST: The DNC.

CATHY WURZER: I got to get some sleep. Yes, the DNC in Chicago. Gwen Walz, First Lady Gwen Walz is going to be on a bus tour going into Philadelphia and Pennsylvania. And Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff will also be there, too. So we'll get to see some of the spouses, too.

BRIAN BAKST: That's one of the things with these presidential campaigns. You see all the family members. I imagine, hoping, Gus will have some role in the months ahead as well.

CATHY WURZER: And maybe Scout. Who knows? I'm wondering here, debates, gentlemen. What do we know about the debates at this point?

CLAY MASTERS: Well, we know there's one coming up on September 10, or at least we think we know. Donald Trump has kind of gone back and forth on debates with Kamala Harris. But right now, that's on ABC, I believe? And so we know that's going to happen. And I know that there has been talk about there being a vice presidential debate happening at some point between Governor Walz and Senator Vance.

BRIAN BAKST: And Walz and Vance have been jousting from afar, both talking about how they can't wait to get on stage with the other. That hasn't been set yet. We don't know when, where, or how.

CATHY WURZER: Actually, that would be a very interesting debate, I think. So, again, lots of prime time televised speeches next week. And our coverage will be live.

BRIAN BAKST: We'll have some live coverage in the evening, just as we did for the Republican convention. But these two are going to be working quite a bit to bring stuff to your show, to Tom Kranz's show, to this show, lots of shows. Angela Davis is even getting a taste.

CATHY WURZER: Oh, my gosh. All right, anything else you want to say before you go?

MARK ZDECHLIK: It'll be an interesting convention. It was interesting to see Republicans in Milwaukee. What an extraordinary thing to have the president make it through an assassination attempt two days before that. And certainly for Democrats, it's an extraordinary time, too, with President Biden no longer being on the ticket.

CLAY MASTERS: Yeah, and as a political reporter in 2024, I'm obligated to say the word "unprecedented." And as you were saying, the lineup, how unprecedented is it that the sitting president is speaking on the first day of the convention?

CATHY WURZER: True.

BRIAN BAKST: And Cathy, you used this number earlier in the show, 83 days to Election Day, only 37 until voting starts in Minnesota. Early voting starts on September 20. So not a lot of time between now and then for these campaigns to really get their affairs in order.

CATHY WURZER: I didn't even remember that. It's just everything's a blur at this point. And only 83 days left. I appreciate your time. I know you all are really tired. Good luck, by the way, Mark and Clay.

MARK ZDECHLIK: Thank you.

CLAY MASTERS: Thanks.

CATHY WURZER: Safe travels. Brian Bakst, thank you so much. You and your team are fantastic. By the way, of course, if you're looking for more political news, of course we have it on our website. You can sign up, by the way, for the newsletter.

BRIAN BAKST: Capitol View newsletter.

CATHY WURZER: Capitol View newsletter. By the way, I get it fresh every morning. It's fantastic. You can get it. Sign up at mprnews.org. And, of course, check out the reporting from our politics team, which is second to none.

OK, so thank you for listening to the program. We, of course, have another program tomorrow here in Minnesota Now. In case you missed any of this, we have a podcast for that, of course. You can check out our podcast wherever you get your podcasts. It's the Minnesota Now podcast.

I haven't even said anything about the weather the whole hour. What the heck? It's actually not that bad. So go and enjoy the rest of the day because it's going to get wet. Showers and thunderstorms are going to move into the region. A little bit of rain right now in southwestern Minnesota.

It's going to get pretty soggy here tonight. Showers and thunderstorms likely around the State of Minnesota. Tomorrow, also wet. But we dry out a little bit on Friday. Saturday, Sunday, look fantastic. Dry conditions, highs will be in the 80s.

Stick around. Coming up, more news here on MPR.

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