Minnesota’s first lady, Gwen Walz, a lifelong educator who could soon graduate to the nation’s second lady as her husband, Tim Walz, runs to be Kamala Harris’ No. 2, took a break from packing for the upcoming Democratic National Convention to hop on a Zoom call with hundreds of women supporting the campaign in Utah — not all of them Democrats.
“I’m trying to find the right suitcases for the children and, you know, all that goes into it,” Walz told her Beehive State listeners, many of whom were also mothers. “So I lost a little bit track of time, and my alarm went off, and I’m like, ‘Oh my goodness, I’m on that call in 10 minutes.’ So you’re getting me as I really look here.”
Wearing a pair of glasses and a zip-up sweater with her hair pulled back, Walz recounted stories that have become familiar to many Americans in the week since Harris tapped her husband, Minnesota’s governor, as her running mate.
She told stories about observing her husband’s character as she taught alongside him. She also recalled the couple’s difficulty having children and how important it was to them to be able to turn to fertility treatments.
“As teachers, we always try to model and impart the importance of respecting others — that’s just how we do it,” Walz said. “And that means you keep your nose in your own business. Tim says that another way, you’ve probably heard it. Well, [former President Donald] Trump and [vice presidential candidate JD] Vance might need a little tutorial on that lesson.”
While supporting her husband’s campaign, Walz said she is “especially outraged” about portions of Trump’s platform that would result in slashed funds for public schools and the conservative push “to rip away more of our reproductive rights, including infertility and [in vitro fertilization] treatments ... is personal for me.”
The “Utah Women for Kamala” call headlined by Walz set out to raise $47,000 for the Harris campaign. At the end of two dozen speakers who largely echoed Walz’s sentiments, they brought in more than $50,000 from hundreds of donors.
It’s been 60 years since a Democratic presidential candidate last won in Utah, and the Harris-Walz campaign isn’t likely to change that. The Cook Political Report categorizes Utah as “Solid R,” and predicts its six electoral votes will be cast for Trump.
So for Harris’ backers in Utah, their focus is pooling money to help the vice president’s campaign in swing states and volunteering to make calls as part of a nationwide phone bank.
“I don’t think that it’s going to be a surprise to any of you when I say that Utah’s electoral votes are probably not going to Kamala Harris this year,” Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall, one of Utah’s most powerful Democrats, told participants. “But that does not mean that we, as Utah women, are off of the hook. We have to do everything that we can to ensure that Vice President Harris and Gov. Tim Walz can win nationwide.”
If elected, Harris would be the first female president. She is already the first Black and South Asian woman to become a major party’s presidential nominee. Several Black and South Asian women joined the call — some tearing up — to describe what Harris’ candidacy means to them.
“It’s hard for me not to get emotional on this call knowing what it would be like to have a Black woman in the presidency,” said Michelda George Castro, who manages a small-business loan fund in the Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity. “She brings a strong, inclusive vision for America.”
The call is one of a wave of online fundraising calls being organized in recent weeks for the Harris campaign, including a Latter-day Saints for Harris-Walz call earlier this month that drew more than 1,400 participants.
It comes barely a month after Harris made a fundraising stop in Park City while President Joe Biden still led the ticket, and two weeks before Trump’s scheduled Park City fundraiser.