Tim Walz revealed during his debate against JD Vance that his son, Gus Walz, witnessed a shooting at a community centre while he was playing volleyball. The Minnesota governor said that school shootings in the US “break your heart,” adding that he has met families of children who were killed at Sandy Hook.
Talking about Gus, Walz said, “I 100% believe that Senator Vance hates it.” Walz extended an olive branch on the issue even though the Harris-Walz campaign has blasted Vance for saying school shootings were a “fact of life.”
“First of all, I didn’t know that your 17-year-old witnessed a shooting. I’m sorry about that,” Vance replied.
“I’m sorry about that. Christ have mercy,” he added. “It is awful. And I appreciate what Tim said.”
Before Walz’s revelation about his son, Vance said while talking about gun violence, “We have to make the doors locked better. We have to make the doors stronger. We’ve got to make the windows stronger, and of course, we’ve got to increase school resource officers. Because the idea that we can magically wave a wand and take guns out of the hands of bad guys, it just doesn’t fit with recent experience.”
Tim Walz’s gaffe
In a gaffe during the debate at one point, Walz said he has become “friends” with school shooters. Walz made the mistake after moderators asked him how he changed his mind about banning “assault weapons.” “I sat in that office with those Sandy Hook parents. I became friends with school shooters. I’ve seen it,” Walz said.
Walz also said that he would have his gun in the back of his car to go “pheasant hunting” after “football practice.”
Walz also said that we should look to Finland if America wants to stop school shootings. “They don’t have this happen,” he 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 went on to suggest that the federal government played a role in taking away “some of these weapons out there.” However, he did not 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.”
