Opinion

Is it weird to choose Tim Walz?

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Charles Lane: The other two reported finalists were somewhat more politically moderate candidates from swing states: Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania and Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona. Let’s compare and contrast between Walz and those two and whether you think picking Walz over those options is a smart move for Harris electorally.

Molly Roberts: So start with Kelly because I want to kind of move him out of the way. The thing with Kelly is that he’s an astronaut: Great, that’s really cool. Besides that, he just didn’t really seem to have it.

Move to Shapiro, who absolutely has it. He’s a great orator. There were a lot of comparisons to Barack Obama. The big advantage to Shapiro was Pennsylvania. And the big disadvantage to Walz is that there’s not as clear an electoral case.

The other contrast that I think is useful to make is, as you said, the centrist vs. left point of view. Walz is much more favored by the left of the party. Shapiro was getting a lot of criticism, particularly on Israel-Gaza. I think you can make the argument for Walz by saying that unity is going to be important. He is certainly the unity candidate.

Matt Bai: I never really got the geographic case for Shapiro because I feel like if you need the governor of Pennsylvania to win Pennsylvania as a Democrat in this election, you’ve got deeper problems. But to Molly’s point, I think Vice President Kamala Harris has only a couple of months here to launch what is a very difficult campaign. If I’m sitting in her shoes, what I really can’t afford is a divided base. I really have to consolidate my base before I can think about anything else. And so, you know, with both Kelly and Shapiro, you had issues that were going to be divisive on some level with the base. Maybe not cataclysmically, but you don’t have that with Tim Walz. And that has to be a big advantage

Chuck Lane: I agree with both of you to the extent that I think this was a pick made mainly on the basis of unifying the party. That is a key selling point for Walz, and I’m hearing that from Democrats.

And yet I disagree that it’s necessarily so smart politically. You’re right, Matt, if you need to pick the popular governor of Pennsylvania to carry Pennsylvania, you’ve got deeper problems. And … Harris has deeper problems. Pennsylvania is basically the whole ballgame in this election. And if you had the opportunity to even marginally raise your chances of winning it, you would have been well advised to take it.

This pick, speaking of party unity, is playing very badly among Jewish Democrats. There is whispering that this is the choice of the pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel, whatever you want to call it, wing of the party. No, I don’t think Jewish Democrats are going to desert the party over this. But I do think this will be seen as a move in the direction of the progressive base of the party. And I think if you’re trying to carry a purple state like Pennsylvania, that could be a problem.

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