Tim Walz admitted to drinking and driving after he was arrested in Nebraska in 1995 for driving 96 miles per hour in a 55 mph zone. Walz, who was 31 at the time of his arrest, took a deal and pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of reckless driving.
Tim Walz admitted to drunken driving in 1995. But his 2006 congressional campaign claimed he didn’t.
Walz’s old drunken-driving arrest has drawn renewed scrutiny since Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris chose him as her running mate.
The Minnesota Star Tribune
August 15, 2024 at 10:06PM
“Mr. Walz now, I think, has taken the opportunity to turn this into a positive for him and his students,” Walz’s attorney at the time, Russell Harford, said in a court transcript obtained by Alpha News, a conservative Minnesota news outlet. “Now he is, I guess, ministering, so-to-speak, to the students about all the bad things that can happen to you if you drink and drive and get caught for drinking and driving.”
But when Walz entered the political world in 2006, his congressional campaign repeatedly claimed he didn’t drive drunk. His campaign manager, Kerry Greeley, told the Rochester Post Bulletin that Walz was speeding when he was pulled over, but wasn’t drunk. She attributed it to Walz not being able to understand the officer due to hearing loss he suffered from years as an artillerist in the National Guard. Greeley shared a similar statement with the Star Tribune at the time, saying Walz “was caught speeding, he doesn’t deny it and that’s the end of it.”
Meredith Salsbery, communications director for the 2006 campaign, also denied Walz was drunk at the time: “The DUI charge was dropped for a reason: It wasn’t true,” Salsbery said to a North Mankato television station. “The trooper had him drive to the station and then leave on his own after being at the station. Tim feels bad about speeding and has paid the ticket and apologized to his family at the time it happened.”
An archived copy of the police incident report states Walz failed field sobriety tests and a preliminary breath test. It also states Walz was transported to a hospital for a blood test and then to the Dawes County jail.
The Minnesota governor’s 1995 arrest has drawn renewed scrutiny since Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris chose him to be her running mate. It’s unclear why members of Walz’s first congressional campaign denied his drunken driving.
The Harris-Walz campaign, Greeley and Salsbery, who now goes by Meredith Vadis, did not respond to requests for comment.
Walz was forthcoming about the incident when he ran for governor in 2018. He told the Star Tribune he had been watching college football with friends before he was arrested. The court transcript stated Walz’s blood-alcohol level was 0.128, above the legal limit.
It was a gut-check moment for Walz, who gave up alcohol afterwards in favor of Diet Mountain Dew and has been sober ever since.
“You have obligations to people,” Gwen Walz recalled telling her husband. “You can’t make dumb choices.”
According to the court transcript, Walz’s attorney Harford said, “Mr. Walz is a teacher at the Alliance High School, has been for quite a few years. He feels terrible about this, was real disappointed, I guess, in himself.”
Harford added that Walz immediately reported the incident to his principal and resigned from his extracurricular duties, including his football coaching responsibilities. Walz even offered to resign his teaching position, Harford said.
Jeff Tomlin, who was Alliance’s head football coach at the time, said Walz owned up to his mistake.
“I think that’s what a person of integrity does,” Tomlin said in a recent interview. “He responded in a positive way as far as not letting it define him. He took it and made himself better, and that’s the most anybody can do.”
Walz is far from the only Minnesota politician to have a drunken-driving arrest in their past.
Minnesota Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Emmer received a DWI-related ticket when he was 20 years old, and a second DWI charge a decade later. He pleaded guilty to careless driving and had two drunken-driving charges dropped.
DFL state Reps. Dan Wolgamott and Brion Curran each pleaded guilty to drunken driving in the past year. GOP state Rep. Matt Grossell pleaded guilty to drunken driving last year.
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