Harris seeks to bridge Israel gap with Walz pick

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz’s addition to the Democratic ticket is stoking optimism among critics of the Biden administration’s handling of Israel’s war in Gaza, but without alienating pro-Israel supporters.

When it comes to perhaps the party’s trickiest foreign policy issue, Walz is supported by a number of pro-Israel groups opposed to conditioning any U.S. aid to Israel, but has also raised hopes from groups demanding the U.S. take a harder line toward Israel to end the war. 

“Adding Walz to the ticket gives Harris a seasoned running mate with some real anti-war credentials,” wrote Daniel Larison, a columnist for the online magazine of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. 

“How much Walz will influence Harris’s own foreign policy views remains to be seen, but on many of the important foreign policy issues of the last two decades Walz has been on the side of diplomacy rather than war.”

Walz has spoken favorably about the “uncommitted” movement, the project born out of opposition to President Biden’s handling of Israel’s war against Hamas.

“These folks are asking for a change in course. They’re asking for more pressure to be put on [Israel],” Walz said of the uncommitted movement in an interview with MPR News in March.

Nearly 400,000 people voted uncommitted in Democratic primaries between January and March, with more than 100,000 uncommitted voters in Michigan, a key swing state.

In Minnesota, about 46,000 people voted uncommitted during the Democratic primary. In 2016, Hillary Clinton won Minnesota against Donald Trump by about 43,000 votes, underscoring the importance of every vote. 

Elianne Farhat, senior adviser to Uncommitted and executive director of Take Action Minnesota, described Walz as having a “remarkable ability to evolve as a public leader” and challenged him to take a harder stance on Israel. 

“As Harris’ vice presidential pick, it’s crucial he continues this evolution by supporting an arms embargo on Israel’s war and occupation against Palestinians in an effort to unite our party to defeat authoritarianism in the fall,” Farhat said in a statement.

Walz is seen as having expressed more sympathy for the plight of Palestinian civilians than Biden, but he also has expressed support for Israel’s right to defend itself. While in Congress, Walz voted for U.S. economic and military assistance to Israel and expanding the strategic partnership. 

“In a way his foreign policy views have been a little bit more anti-war than other Democrats,” said Lama El Baz, research assistant for public opinion and U.S. foreign policy at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. 

“I think the choice of Walz definitely does appeal more to a younger, more pro-Palestinian crowd.”

Harris picked Walz over Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, who was seen as a finalist for the position. Shapiro had faced opposition from some on the left for his own criticisms of pro-Palestinian demonstrators.

As a candidate for the House in the 2006 midterms, Walz won over a Republican district with a campaign critical of the U.S. war in Iraq. He cited his 24-year career in the Army National Guard and time spent as a teacher — where he did a stint abroad in China at the time of the Tiananmen Square massacre — as informing his views of standing up for human rights while also keeping the U.S. engaged in the world. 

In Congress, he voted to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq; sought to end U.S. assistance for Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen; and opposed unilateral strikes against the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. He supported the Obama-era nuclear deal with Iran, which Trump withdrew the U.S. from in 2018. 

“Now that she is atop the presidential ticket, Vice President Kamala Harris must define her own approach to the world. The choice of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate might help,” wrote Mark Hannah, a senior fellow at the Institute for Global Affairs, and Rachel Rizzo, a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Europe Center, in an essay for Foreign Policy. 

“Walz may help Harris reinvest in diplomacy and abandon America’s reflex for world-saving military interventionism.”

Walz is seen as having appeal on these issues to young voters and voters of color, two key demographic that helped push Biden over the finish line in 2020 in battleground states, El Baz said.

“I think Harris and Walz are fighting on two fronts. There are the more centrist people, on-the-fence on who to vote for, who’s party lines are a little blurred these days, and uncommitted Arab-American, Muslim-American voters in these key battleground states.”

While Walz appears to have an appeal for a more empathetic U.S. policy toward Palestinians, his record in Congress — and his support as governor on other key policy issues like Ukraine and Taiwan — demonstrate a balance between holding back American troop engagement and deepening engagement with countries on the front lines of aggression. 

At a time when Republicans are increasingly opposed to sending U.S. economic and military aid to Ukraine, Walz as governor has expressed solidarity with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and deepened economic ties between Minnesota and Ukraine. 

In February, Walz signed a memorandum of understanding on agricultural cooperation between Minnesota and Ukraine’s Chernihiv Oblast. Minnesota’s 5th District, represented by Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar, is home to production of weapons manufacturers that send munitions to Ukraine. 

On Taiwan, the democratic, self-governing island that China claims as its own, Walz has encouraged increased trade and investment between his state and Taipei. There’s generally bipartisan backing for the U.S. to express strong support for Taiwan in the face of Chinese aggression, but Trump is increasingly staking out a position of criticizing Taipei as too dependent on U.S. security. 

“When it comes to Walz, the lines are a bit blurred for his anti-war and anti-intervention because he does still support sending economic and military aid, to Israel in particular, while still opposing sending troops,” El Baz said. 

And while foreign policy is not usually a priority motivator for voters, El Baz said younger voters and voters of color are increasingly focused on what America’s role in the world should be.

“We’re seeing young Americans are less likely to say that the United States should play an active role in world affairs, which, at first glance, that’s kind of shocking. But when we’ve looked at other data points, we’ve seen that actually, they oppose sending troops in a wide range of circumstances, but at the same time, they support a lot of international agreements,” she explained.

“And so I think young Americans, especially, are sort of straying away from U.S. foreign policy that emphasizes military engagement and are kind of pivoting towards more diplomatic engagement internationally.”