A focus group of Democrats, independents and Republicans reacted to the moment when Gov. Tim Walz called himself a “knucklehead” for claiming to have been in Hong Kong during the Tiananmen Square massacre.
Moderators confronted Walz on the claim during the CBS News Vice Presidential Debate Tuesday night. Walz admitted that he only traveled to Asia in August 1989, several months after the April 15 massacre. The focus group found that voters were initially skeptical of Walz’s answer, but he eventually recovered.
“Can you explain that discrepancy?” a moderator asked, as the focus group remained neutral.
“Look, I grew up in small rural Nebraska, a town of 400. A town that you rode your bikes with your buddies until the streetlights come on, and I’m proud of that service. I joined the national guard at 17, worked on family farms, and then I used the GI bill to become a teacher. Passionate about it. Young teacher. My first year out, I got the opportunity in the summer of ’89 to travel to China–35 years ago, to be able to do that,” Walz said.
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“I came back home and started a program to take young people there. We would take basketball teams, we would take baseball teams, we would take dancers, and we would go back and forth to China,” he added.
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The focus group showed support from Republicans, independents and Democrats all going down for Walz during the first portion of his response.
However, Walz recovered among independents and Democrats when he went on to admit that he can be “a knucklehead at times.”
“Many times I will talk a lot. I will get caught up in the rhetoric,” he said, as support from independents rose above 50% in the focus group.
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Walz’s support among Republicans dipped to its lowest point – under 10% – when he said former President Donald Trump would have benefited from participating in one of his China trips, arguing Trump would never have befriended Chinese President Xi Jinping.
