Football coach and cheerleader: How Tim Walz is defining masculinity in 2024 MANKATO, Minnesota — Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign has made Tim Walz’s stereotypically masculine traits − a sports-lover, military veteran, gun owner and father − central to his introduction to America’s voters.
It’s been a steady theme for the Democrats over the last two months – visiting college and high school football games, hunting for pheasants, hawking camo hats – as a counterweight to Donald Trump and JD Vance, their
Republican rivals who are making a play for the “bro vote” and whose surrogates have tried to cast doubt on the 60-year-old Minnesota governor’s macho credentials.
- Walz’s latest pitch came Friday on The Rich Eisen Show, a popular sports podcast where he ditched his political stump speech to
- boast about the Minnesota Vikings’ 5-0 record and reminisce on the glory days of his time as a defensive coordinator for a high school football team.
- We had a responsibility defense, I know it’s gonna shock some folks on the political side, but I’m super conservative,” he joked.
From appearing on podcasts for jocks to jabs about “childless cat ladies” to the debate over reproductive rights, the 2024 presidential campaign has had its share of direct appeals to voters around issues of gender and gender stereotypes.
The possibility that Harris could become the first female president, and where Walz would be stepping into uncharted waters as the No. 2 serving under her, suggests that some of the same tensions seen during this White House race could resonate into a potential Harris administration.
Consider the battle of who has the more macho merchandise, which ensued after the July assassination attempt on Trump — “Fight! Fight! Fight!” shirts depicting Trump raising his fist in the air being hauled off stage by Secret Service quickly went viral.
After Walz’s elevation to the national stage: the Democratic campaign hawked ‘Harris Walz’ branded camo hats with bright orange lettering resembling something for sale at a hunting store. A brief video clip of Walz fumbling with shotgun shells and a photo of him without his weapon in a southern Minnesota field during the annual pheasant home opener last Saturday prompted the .
MAGA-aligned internet to question whether his years of experience as a hunter were little more than a campaign tactic. The former Democratic U.S. representative has long prided himself of being the top shot in the Congressional Shootout, often using the anecdote on the stump to push for gun reform.
He talks about this: ‘I’m a big hunter, I had a gun in my car’ and then you see a photo and he looks like a moron loading a shot gun,” Sean Spicer, the former Trump administration White House press secretary, told USA TODAY.
“It was like he was dressing up for Halloween and said, ‘I’m going to be a man this year.'”
