Gaffes, misstatements or lies? Walz’s inaccurate past statements draw scrutiny.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz’s past words have come under heavy scrutiny as the vice-presidential nominee campaigns nationally alongside Kamala Harris.

The latest example centers on Walz’s past claim that he was in Hong Kong during the deadly Tiananmen Square protests in 1989. Walz moved to China that year to teach English, and he later launched a company that brought U.S. students to the country on educational trips.

Several news outlets reported this week that Walz was actually in Nebraska at the time of the Tiananmen Square protests and didn’t leave for China until more than two months after the massacre. Walz was questioned about the discrepancy during his debate against Ohio U.S. Sen. JD Vance on Tuesday.

“I’ve not been perfect,” Walz said. “I got there that summer and misspoke.”

Walz elaborated further in a brief exchange with reporters in Pennsylvania on Wednesday, saying, “Look, I have my dates wrong.” He said he was in Hong Kong in August 1989, not in the spring, and that being there at that time “was profound for me — that was the summer of democracy.”

The governor suggested he needs to be more careful when speaking: “I speak like everybody else speaks.”

Walz has an energetic and extemporaneous speaking style that helps him connect with voters in terms they can relate to. But it can land him in awkward situations when he misspeaks or makes inconsistent remarks.

It’s not the first time Walz has had to clarify previous inaccurate statements. The Harris-Walz campaign said the governor misspoke in a 2018 video when he referenced “weapons of war that I carried in war.” Walz served 24 years in the National Guard but never saw combat, and he’s never otherwise claimed that he did.

After the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that embryos created through in-vitro fertilization (IVF) should be considered children, Walz opened up about his family’s fertility journey and strongly implied that he and his wife used IVF. They actually used a common treatment called intrauterine insemination. A Harris-Walz campaign spokesperson said the governor “talks how normal people talk” and was “using commonly understood shorthand for fertility treatments.”

Vance and other Republicans have argued that Walz’s inaccurate statements aren’t accidental. They’ve accused him of lying for political gain.

“Walz said he served in a war and he didnt. Walz said his children were conceived via IVF and they weren’t (just a bonkers lie),” Vance wrote in an Aug. 27 post on X, formerly Twitter. “Forgive us for thinking that a person without integrity shouldn’t go anywhere near the oval office.”

Vance and former President Donald Trump have told their own share of falsehoods. Trump baselessly claimed the 2020 election was stolen and continues to repeat it to this day. Both Trump and Vance recently pushed false claims that Haitian migrants were eating people’s pets in Ohio; Vance stuck with the claim even after it was debunked. Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, called the claim “a piece of garbage that was simply not true.”

Leah Solo worked on Walz’s first congressional campaign in 2006 and was his campaign manager when he ran for governor in 2018. Solo said Walz is a “genuine human being,” and she doesn’t think Republicans’ attempts to frame him as a liar will stick.

“I feel like people don’t believe it, and I think they don’t believe because there’s just not much to it,” she said.

Some of the attacks, Solo said, have simply been “ridiculous.” She referenced how some Republicans tried to push a false online narrative that Walz lied about the identity of his dog.

“I think that could absolutely backfire, especially when you see how ridiculous it is,” Solo said.

But former GOP gubernatorial candidate Scott Jensen said Walz’s inaccurate statements over the years raise questions about his credibility: “Is Tim Walz’ willingness to embellish and veer from the absolute truth a problem in terms of him being a national leader?”

“This isn’t just a folksy Midwestern guy who [is] just speaking the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth,” said Jensen, who ran against Walz in 2022.

Jensen accused Walz during the 2022 campaign of leaving the National Guard shortly before the battalion he led was deployed to Iraq. There’s no evidence that Walz intentionally timed his retirement from the Guard to avoid deployment.

Walz submitted his retirement papers in May 2005 after serving 24 years, and his unit’s first call-up notice came in July. However, Walz’s congressional campaign issued a statement in March 2005 saying he still planned to run despite a possible mobilization of Minnesota National Guard soldiers.

Vance has revived Jensen’s criticism of Walz’s military exit over the past couple months, accusing the Minnesota Democrat of “stolen valor.” But it’s unclear if the attack has altered voters’ opinions of Walz. A New York Times poll published before the debate found that Walz is viewed more favorably than Vance in the three Midwestern states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Ohio.

“Tim Walz has that unique quality, and I don’t know how you get it, of being somewhat like Teflon. Nothing sticks,” Jensen said. “There may be some whittling at the edges on credibility in Tim Walz, but is it sticking in a meaningful way? Not really.”