MAGA Ad’s Claims of Tim Walz Debunked
MAGA Inc., AKA “Make America Great Again” Inc., is a Super PAC which supports former president Donald Trump. They recently released a campaign ad targeting Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, Kamala Harris’s running mate. The ad, released on August 6, refers to Walz as “Chief Weirdo.” It claims he supports legislation that “endangers minors, hurts women, and puts radical ideology over common sense.” The ad concludes by insisting that Harris wants Walz to “enforce these laws on a national scale.” Here are the few facts they got straight, and all the ones they got wrong.
@MAGAIncWarRoom on X posted the ad alongside the statements, “Tim Walz is a weird radical liberal.” The post continues with, “What could be weirder than signing a bill requiring schools to stock tampons in boys’ bathrooms?” followed by, “Or weirder than signing legislation allowing minors to receive sex change operations?” Essentially the ad makes three main claims about Walz’s legislative history surrounding gender-affirming care. While some of the claims are rooted in facts, they are mostly exaggerations.
The ad first claims Walz signed a law requiring tampons be stocked in boys’ bathrooms across the state, citing an Alpha News article from 2023. Walz did in fact sign a bill into law requiring menstrual products be supplied in school bathrooms across the state. The bill, Minnesota 121A.212, went into effect January 1, 2024. It states, “A school district or charter school must provide students with access to menstrual products at no charge,” and that those products be available to “all menstruating students in restrooms regularly used by students in grades 4 to 12, according to a plan developed by the school district.”
Yes, this means that ALL bathrooms, girls, boys, and gender-neutral, must provide menstrual products. The law is not limited to tampons. Pads could be provided to meet the requirements as well. The bill was introduced by Minnesota state Rep. Sandra Feist, who comments, “While the vast majority of the period products will be used in the girls’ bathrooms, the decision was made to structure the bill as gender-inclusive in order to ensure that trans and nonbinary students who menstruate would have equal access to the products they need.” Unsuccessfully, Republicans attempted to amend the law to apply solely to girls’ bathrooms. Feist noted the importance of extending access across restrooms. “We know that these students face even greater barriers and stigma around menstruation and wanted them to be able to privately access these products.”
The ad then argues that Walz backed “legislation allowing minors to receive sex change operations.” This claim is cited by a 2023 Associated Press article, which does suggest Walz’s support for gender-affirming care. However, the article specifically discusses the 2023 “trans refuge state” executive order. The executive order (not legislation) protects families and care providers from prosecution from other states regarding gender-affirming care. The article does not mention Walz passing legislation allowing surgery for minors.
Minnesota state Rep. Leigh Finke sponsored this bill. As she explains, “I sponsored legislation protecting access to gender-affirming care and requiring certain health insurance plans to cover gender-affirming care. All gender-affirming care in the state of Minnesota is done following national and international standards of care. Those standards of care have not been changed by Governor Walz or any legislation introduced under his governorship.” Under the given standards of care, genital surgery cannot be performed until patients “reach the legal age of majority in a given country” and have continuously lived a year in the gender role aligning with their gender identity.
In rare cases, trans-masc youth may undergo top surgeries. Statistically, however, cisgender boys are more likely to receive top surgery for medical issues than transmasculine minors. In 2019, only 85 trans minors in the U.S. received any kind of gender-affirming surgery, and most of these procedures were top surgeries. Again, the article cited by MAGA does not discuss Walz passing any legislation allowing gender-affirming surgery for minors.
Finally, the ad mentions Harris wanting Walz to implement these policies nationally. Here, MAGA cited a Washington Examiner article which was published before Walz was even announced as Harris’ running mate. He is not even mentioned in the article. In addition, no laws give a vice president free reign to enforce state laws on the national level. And even if Congress passed the same bills federally, the president and their administration decide its fate. Although the Harris campaign aims to protect gender-affirming care, the MAGA campaign ad paints an overdramatized image of Walz. “Tim Walz. Too Weird. Too Radical,” the ad concludes. After MAGA’s grandeur of exaggerations of Walz, you’d think they’d have a better slogan for him.
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