Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz fumbled a response about school shootings during Tuesday night’s debate against JD Vance, saying he’s become “friends” with the shooters.
The moderators asked Walz how he changed his mind about banning “assault weapons” over his career.
“I sat in that office with those Sandy Hook parents. I’ve become friends with school shooters. I’ve seen it,” Walz said.
Pollsters, pundits and politicians immediately panned Walz for the embarrassing gaffe.
“’I’ve become friends with school shooters’ may be the worst line in any 2024 debate,” said political pollster and consultant Frank Luntz.
Fellow pollster Patrick Ruffini was nonplussed.
“See, this is useful,” floated Fox News contributor Guy Benson. “Walz saying he’s become friends with school shooters, when he meant victims, is an innocent misstatement.
“Repeatedly lying about his military rank, his DUI, IVF and Hong Kong/Tiananmen Square are not innocent misstatements.”
National Review contributor Andy McCarthy pushed back.
“Walz obviously misspoke, he didn’t mean he’d become friends with school shooters. C’mon. This is a good, high-minded debate as things go these days. Let’s not make s–t up.”
“I am not friends with school shooters,” deadpanned X user Three Year Letterman. “I am here to take firm stands even if they are not popular.”
US Reps. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) and Nancy Mace (R-SC) reposted the quote, with Luna adding that it was “concerning.”
Even former President Donald Trump got in on the action, posting a Trump-Vance 2024 sign on his Truth Social with a slogan written underneath: “Not friends with school shooters.”
His campaign also reposted video footage of Walz stumbling over his words.
“My daughter was killed in the Parkland school shooting,” posted Andrew Pollack, the father of Meadow Pollack, who was killed at the 2018 massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida.
“It’s absolutely abhorrent that Tim Walz has befriended school shooters. Disqualifying.”
Walz made another appeal to gun owners, however, when he said he used to have his gun in the back of his car so he could go “pheasant hunting” after “football practice.”
He also said that if America wants to stop school shootings — we should look to Finland.
“They don’t have this happen,” the Minnesota governor said. “Even though they have a high gun ownership rate in the country, there are reasonable things that we can do to make a difference.”
Walz suggested the federal government had a role in taking away “some of these weapons out there” — but didn’t specify which.
“I appreciate what Tim said, actually, about Finland,” Vance responded, “because I do think it illustrates some of the frankly weird differences between our own country’s gun violence problem and Finland.”
The Ohio senator said that the US, unlike Finland, grapples with higher rates of depression and anxiety.
Vice President Kamala Harris has pledged to “ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, require universal background checks, and support red flag laws that keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people,” according to her and Walz’s campaign website.
The National Rifle Association, America’s gun lobby, formerly gave Walz an “A” rating for his voting record on gun legislation — but has downgraded him to an “F” during his two terms as governor.
The Harris-Walz campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.