‘They chose the billionaire’: Tim Walz returns to Minnesota as part of ‘revenge’ tour

Tim Walz is trying to regroup to help Democrats fight the Trump administration, but he’s still trying to figure out why he and his party lost in November.

“I knew it was my job to try and pick off those other swing states, and we didn’t,” he said about the 2024 election. “I come back home to lick my wounds and say, goddamn, at least we won here.”

Walz was speaking on Saturday in Rochester, Minnesota – in the district he once represented in Congress, as part of his soul-searching tour around the country after the Democrats’ bruising 2024 defeat.

Walz’s tour is part brand redemption, part Democratic catharsis, part rally. He hasn’t ruled out a 2028 run for president, though neither have most 2028 hopefuls.

“I thought it was a flex that I was the poorest person and the only public school teacher to ever run for vice-president of the United States,” Walz told a crowd of roughly 1,500 people that filled an auditorium and spilled into an overflow room on a Saturday morning. “They chose the billionaire. We gotta do better.”

Many in the crowd remembered when Walz represented them in Congress, and asked him how he would fight against the dismantling of the Department of Education, defend the rights of trans people and build a bigger tent for Democrats.

Walz’s town hall was one of many large Democratic events in recent days, proving there’s growing energy for a forceful resistance to the US president. Much bigger crowds have turned up to see Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on a “stop oligarchy” tour. People have also filled town halls around the country to tell their elected officials how they’re affected by government cuts and policy changes. But where the energy goes remains to be seen.

It’s clear Walz still captures the attention of a rightwing outrage machine. He chided Fox News and other pundits during an appearance on Gavin Newsom’s podcast, saying they made fun of him for drinking from a straw and don’t think he’s masculine enough, but he could “kick their ass”. Fox host Jesse Watters then railed against the clip and detailed things men shouldn’t do, like eat soup in public.

Trump called Walz a “loser” on Friday. “He lost an election. He played a part. You know, usually a vice-president doesn’t play a part ... I think he was so bad that he hurt her.”

At a prior rally in Wisconsin, Walz mocked Tesla, saying he watches the falling stock to get a “little boost” each day, leading to condemnation on the right. “Sometimes when I need a little boost, I look at the @JDVance portrait in the White House and thank the Lord,” Musk wrote on Twitter/X.

At the Saturday town hall, Walz took aim at Musk. “This guy bugs me in a way that’s probably unhealthy,” he said.

“They’re all butthurt about the Tesla thing, but they don’t care about the disrespect they have shown to employees at the Minneapolis VA who care for our veterans, and they fire them. They don’t care,” Walz said.

Walz held the rally in a region of Minnesota where the congressman, Brad Finstad, is one of many Republicans who haven’t held in-person town halls. Republicans who have hosted events in recent weeks have experienced heated pushback. Signs outside the venue, John Marshall high school, showed Finstad’s face in black and white and said “Missing Congressman”. Finstad told the Rochester Post-Bulletin he wouldn’t commit to hosting an in-person event, but had held tele-town halls.

“I find it funny because Gov. Walz, in the seven years of being governor, has not held one town hall, and now he’s claiming to be the king of town hall,” Finstad said. “This is a Democrat-hosted political comeback for Gov. Walz. Well, let him scream at the bully pulpit.”

During the rally, Walz said Finstad should take notice. “If you’re a sitting member of Congress in the biggest city in your district, and you see 1,300 people on a nice Saturday coming out here, it catches your attention, trust me,” he said.

Thinking about the path forward for Democrats, Walz acknowledges he doesn’t have a solid answer, but said Democrats need to do better at articulating their values and the ways their policies would improve people’s lives. He likes the idea of a “shadow cabinet”, borrowing a UK tradition where opposition parties have their own versions of cabinet members to speak out against the ones in power.

He also said Democrats shouldn’t let Republicans capture the narrative on issues like trans rights.

“To be honest with you, there’s a lot of people who are squishy about this and are willing to say, look, it’s a pretty small number of people,” Walz said. “That’s a dangerous road to go down, because pretty soon you’re part of the group that’s a pretty small number of people.”

He sees the Trump administration as an “existential threat” that will chip away at programs such as social security, but wonders how Democrats aren’t able to message these popular, middle-class issues against oligarchs. “How did this happen?” he pondered.

Once Democrats get back in office, it’s time to shore up the programs they want to protect, he said.

“Donald Trump is on his revenge and retribution tour,” he said. “Well, I said I’ll be on one, too. I’m going to bring revenge just raining down on their heads with their neighbors getting healthcare. They’re gonna rue the day when we got re-elected because our kids with special needs are going to get the care that they need.”