Walz v. Vance: The veepstakes is going to be a rural-off.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz is determined to out-small-town JD Vance.

On the rally stage in Philadelphia, his debut as Kamala Harris’ running mate, Walz launched into an attack he’d been honing for weeks: Donald Trump’s running mate is a Yale-educated venture capitalist who rose in politics by writing a bestseller “trashing” the community where he was raised.

“Come on!” Walz said to the crowd. “That’s not what middle America is.”

Both vice presidential candidates were added to their tickets to help bring in the working-class voters in Midwest and Rust Belt states who could decide the election. Winning those votes will depend on who can be the most authentic messenger, and selling their own rural roots — or bashing their opponents — will be part of the pitch.

Republicans have already gotten to work trying to put a California sheen on Walz’s résumé. Vance, a first-term U.S. senator from Ohio, said in Philadelphia that while both vice presidential contenders are “white guys from the Midwest,” Walz has governed like a “San Francisco-style liberal” in Minnesota.

“What’s different is the actual ideas about how best to serve people, white, Black, or anything else in the Midwest and everywhere else,” Vance said.

But there’s more overlap in their backgrounds. Both Walz and Vance were raised in America’s heartland, Walz in small-town Nebraska and Vance in Ohio. They signed up for the military at a young age and went to college thanks to the G.I. bill. Both saw deployments but never combat. Both have professed a love for Diet Mountain Dew.

In 2016, Vance wrote “Hillbilly Elegy” about his childhood and his mother who struggled with drug abuse. The book became a bestseller at the same time Vance was working and living in San Francisco as a venture capitalist. Walz coached football and taught social studies in Mankato for two decades, staying in the National Guard for 24 years before retiring in 2005 and running for a rural southern Minnesota district in Congress.

“There’s something to be said for staying and sticking with the community,” said Aaron Brown, an Iron Range college professor and writer who chronicles life in rural areas. “Walz will have an easier time projecting that because he still does all the Midwestern stuff, he’s still part of the culture. He doesn’t have to fake it.”

The Harris campaign played up Walz’s rural roots in his rollout as vice presidential nominee, noting he’s a lifelong hunter who worked for decades on agriculture and veterans issues. Social media has exploded with video clips and memes of Walz’s “Midwestern dad” persona. Former U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill told MSNBC Tuesday that Walz is “the guy who JD Vance is pretending to be.”

“It’s what you see, what you hear ... it’s overused, but it’s vibes,” Brown said. “It’s hard to say he’s a San Francisco liberal when you listen to him, that’s the problem that Republicans are going to have.”

Since becoming governor, Republicans say Walz’s positions have shifted far to the left, alienating some voters who used to support him in greater Minnesota. His total vote share from areas outside of the Twin Cities metro dropped from his first bid for governor in 2018 to his second in 2022.

“They liked his position when he was a congressman and his voting record was moderate. He wore an NRA hat, but as soon as he ran for governor, he got rid of that NRA hat,” said Paul Gazelka, a former Republican Senate leader and candidate for governor who lives in Brainerd. “He’s going to have a hard time, by the end, saying he’s for rural America.”

The rural focus is expected to continue throughout the campaign. In early attacks against Walz, the Republican Party resurfaced a 2017 quip he made about rural districts that contain more “rocks and cows” than voters, citing it as evidence that he’s out of touch with the areas he used to represent.

Minnesota Republicans have circulated the clip for years. Walz’s supporters have said it was taken out of context, that he was expressing frustration that Democrats weren’t doing a better job of speaking to rural voters.

Gazelka said he thinks Vance’s story is inspiring and resonating with rural voters. He’s watched the movie version of “Hillbilly Elegy.” “He was able to overcome an abusive situation and was able to make something of himself,” Gazelka said.

Nick Frentz, a Democratic state senator from North Mankato, has known Walz for years. He said he’s hunted and fished with the governor, and that he is who he projects himself to be on the national stage. In the past two days, he said, he’s seen residents in his southern Minnesota district swell with pride over Walz’s ascension to the national ticket.

People were most excited about buying new camouflage Harris-Walz campaign hats, playing on Walz’s habit of dressing down in a ballcap and T-shirt.

“The moment I got the most texts about yesterday was the hat,” Frentz said. “I can’t imagine a better voice for greater Minnesota and rural issues on the Democratic ticket than Tim Walz.”