Tim Walz memes swept the internet as soon as the Minnesota governor was officially announced as Vice President Kamala Harris‘s running mate for the upcoming election. And unlike JD Vance walking into a furniture store, they have been a welcome sight.
Many of the memes have taken to highlighting Walz’s record as a politician. He’s helped provide Minnesota school children with free breakfast and lunch, protected abortion rights in his state, and started the whole “Republican politicians are weird” schtick that’s made a shockingly unshakeable impact in the media in recent weeks.
But beyond that, Walz just seems like a chill dude, especially when compared to his opponents. He has the vibe of someone you would just want to hang out with, maybe catch a Bruce Springsteen or Taylor Swift concert together. In other words, he’s a man of the people—something Trump and Vance desperately want to convince Americans they are, despite seeming more and more detached from reality every day.
While the Republican ticket and their allies have put their focus on fear-mongering and clutching their pearls over “childless cat ladies,” Harris has focused on progress and moving forward.
Walz being “a Midwest princess,” as one Chappell Roan-loving meme-maker put it, is already lending a steady backbone to that messaging. We’ll move forward, it suggests, without leaving anyone behind who doesn’t want to stay entrenched in the past. Walz knows what’s up, and he’s got your back.
And on a more basic level, of course, this new wave of Tim Walz memes is just downright delightful. With the uptick of “weird” as a descriptor of the folks who are way too focused on strangers’ genitals, banning books, and making love to couches, Democrat messaging has finally taken on just a hint of the taunting tenor Republicans have been deploying for too long now. And that is something social media is more than happy to run with.