Mr. Walz drew national notice when Kamala Harris chose him as her running mate. A fraud scandal derailed his bid for re-election as Minnesota’s governor.
Ernesto Londoño, Reporting from St. Paul, Minn.
Seventeen months ago, Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota brimmed with joy in a packed stadium in Pennsylvania as he made his debut as Kamala Harris’s running mate.
Democratic leaders touted him as a rising star with a biography that could help their party defeat Trump. They drew attention to his rural roots, the years he spent working as a public-school teacher, his service in the National Guard and the six terms he spent in Congress representing a conservative-leaning district.
But after losing the 2024 election, Mr. Walz returned to a pile of problems at home, including a widening scandal over fraud in social services programs that left critics questioning his ability to win a third term as governor in November.
