Vice presidential candidate and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz landed at Logan International Airport at 4:05 p.m. on Sunday for a fundraiser appearance on behalf of the Harris Victory Fund at the Boch Center in Boston’s theater district.
Flying in from Saginaw, MI, where Walz spent the last week campaigning, including a stop at a local church service, the candidate was accompanied by his daughter Hope as he exited the campaign plane.
There to greet the governor were various Massachusetts politicians, including Boston Mayor Michelle Wu and her two children, Sen. President Karen Spilka, State Treasurer Deborah Goldberg, Sen. Sal DiDomenico, Sen. Lydia Edwards, Rep. Aaron Michelwitz, Rep. Brandy Oakley, and Steve Kerrigan, chair of the Massachusetts Democratic Party.
In addition, Walz supporters were also present. Joel Gagne, CEO of Allerton Hill Communications, and his family came to the runway decked out in campaign apparel, taking a picture with the candidate on the tarmac.
After leaving the plane, Walz greeted his welcoming party with handshakes and smiles before getting into a roughly dozen-car motorcade to go downtown to the Boch Center, arriving around 4:40 p.m.
At the event, Walz was introduced by Gov. Maura Healey and Sen. Ed Markey before speaking to a crowd of around 100 attendees.
Walz began his remarks by addressing the crowd of prominent Massachusetts donors present at the event, who raised a combined $2.4 million through the event, according to Politico.
“We know you’re going to elect Democrats. We don’t stop in here to treat you like an ATM,” Walz said. “What we understand is, is that the folks here can help.”
Ticket prices for the fundraiser ranged from $500 to $100,000, according to a Boston Globe report.
Walz then quickly turned his attention to Trump and the Republican ticket, criticizing the former president for his stamina and calling his agendas “old, tired, divisive policies from an old, tired, divisive guy.”
“It takes stamina to run for president, and it sure as hell takes stamina to be president. And I just gotta ask you this—it’s very clear Donald Trump doesn’t have that right now,” Walz said. “He’s exhausted, his team is telling you that, and you know all this.”
Walz continued to try to underscore the differences between campaigns.
“This might be the first time in modern American history that the Democratic Party’s two nominees are both gun owners, and the Republican Party nominee can’t pass [a] background check,” Walz said.
The Minnesota governor also used his speech to launch criticisms of Trump’s comments about late golfing legend Arnold Palmer made at a Pennsylvania rally over the weekend, in response to people who say they don’t like Trump but prefer his policies.
“These are folks that are out there, and I run into them—hell, they’re in my family—and … they [say]—’I don’t really like Trump.’ You mean you don’t like him talking about Arnold Palmer in the showers, that stuff you don’t like? … And they get pretty embarrassed,” Walz said.
Finishing his address, Walz recalled his vice presidential debate with JD Vance earlier this month, where Vance refused to directly address a question on whether Trump lost the 2020 election which Walz called “a damning non-answer,” from the debate stage.
Last Wednesday, during a Pennsylvania rally, Vance said that Trump didn’t lose the election “by the words [he] would use.”
“There was only one question in the debate I had with JD Vance [that he couldn’t answer],” Walz told Sunday’s fundraising crowd. “It took him two weeks. He did answer it … He said no. So just be very clear what he was saying was, had he been sitting where Mike Pence was sitting, he would’ve overthrown this government.”
Concluding his speech at around 5:30 p.m., Walz boarded the campaign plane at around 6:05 p.m. heading to Connecticut, where he finished the night with another campaign fundraiser.
