Tim Walz Supercharges Kamala Harris’ Climate Cred

It’s official: Minnesota Governor Tim Walz got the rose.

On Tuesday morning, after days of frenzied speculation that floated names including Governor Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, Arizona Senator Mark Kelly, and Governor Andy Beshear of Kentucky, Kamala Harris announced that Walz’s name will be the one to underline hers on the presumptive Democratic presidential ticket.

Many on the climate left will likely be thrilled by the pick: Of all the finalists reportedly in contention for VP, Walz had the most impressive clean energy and environmental accomplishments. An Army veteran and former congressman of a rural, otherwise conservative Minnesota district, Walz has a record of working across party lines to get things accomplished. In 2009, he memorably voted for the doomed cap-and-trade bill and defended his position to tough crowds of Midwestern farmers and ranchers.

Within months of being sworn in as Governor of Minnesota in 2019, Walz set a goal for his state to get its electricity from 100% carbon-free sources by 2050. At the time, only a few other states had similar goals. “Climate change is an existential threat. We must take immediate action,” Walz argued at the time. “If Washington is not going to lead, Minnesota will lead.”

By the time Walz signed actual emissions legislation into law last year, he’d set an even more ambitious timeline — carbon-free electricity by 2040. The bill also streamlined permitting, set a minimum wage for employees constructing large-scale utility projects, and included an environmental justice provision to keep energy from waste incineration plants in frontline communities from counting toward the 2040 goal. Minnesota continued “crushing it on climate action” in the months that followed, with Walz securing a $2 billion budget package that included grid improvements, solar panels on state-owned buildings, an electric-vehicle rebate program, heat pump grants and rebates, a green bank, and more. He also signed a transportation bill to overhaul transit hubs, expand passenger rail service, improve infrastructure, and offer electric bike credits.

And he hasn’t stopped. Earlier this summer, Walz announced a $200 million grant to reduce food-related pollution, including protecting and restoring carbon-absorbing peatlands, improving food waste programs, and replacing gas-powered agricultural machinery with trucks that run on electricity or clean fuel. The state is also considering bills that would reform building codes to improve access to affordable housing — an issue Walz has taken a personal interest in. Walz is also, apparently, a YIMBY on energy permitting.

Walz’s canny communication skills have already been much remarked upon, and he’s openly recognized that many on the left struggle with a messaging problem regarding climate change. “The surest way to get people to buy in is to create a job that pays well in their community,” the governor told Time’s Justin Worland. “All of us are going to have to be better about our smart politics, about bringing people in.”

Walz’s record isn’t spotless, though. During his congressional career, he earned a score of just 75% from the League of Conservation Voters. Earlier this summer, a coalition of 16 environmental groups, including the local Sierra Club chapter, called out Walz and his administration for being too soft on regulation, including state agencies’ reliance on farmers voluntarily complying with nitrate pollution limits, the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency’s failure to adequately police air quality violations from a foundry in a low-income neighborhood, and what the group argued was a flawed permitting process for a crude oil pipeline built through wetlands. North Dakota Republicans — including Governor Doug Burgum, who’s been floated for a potential Trump cabinet — have pressured Walz to include carbon capture as a carbon-free energy technology under the state’s emissions law (currently, decisions over CCS and hydrogen are under the purview of Minnesota’s Public Utilities Commission).

There’s also the small matter that Harris and Walz have to actually win to be able to enact any of their climate goals. At least on paper, the math had looked slightly better for Pennsylvania Governor Shapiro, who is an incredibly popular governor in a must-win state. “Minnesota is very unlikely to be the tipping point state — less than a 1% chance,” Nate Silver wrote Tuesday morning, arguing that Shapiro would have been a better pick despite mounting criticism from progressives.

Within hours of the news, though, the climate left had already enthusiastically circled around Walz. In a statement, Evergreen Action Executive Director Lena Moffitt applauded Walz’s “masterclass in how to govern in a way that meaningfully improves people’s lives and sets the state up for a thriving future.” Cassidy DiPaola, the communications director at Fossil Free Media and a spokesperson for the Make Polluters Pay campaign, likewise acknowledged Walz’s progress on green issues, nodding to his “evolution into a climate champion.” She added that Walz has more than proven himself at the state level and that “his ability to connect climate policy to the everyday concerns of Midwestern and rural voters could prove invaluable in building broader support for climate action.”

That, after all, will be the big question. Early voting for the next president of the United States begins in 41 days.