Jeff Walz, the older brother of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, commented on his estranged brother's character and toyed with the idea of endorsing former President Donald Trump.
Last month, the younger Walz was selected as Vice President Kamala Harris' running mate in this November's election.
In a Friday evening Facebook comment, Walz, 67, said he hadn't spoken to his younger brother in nearly a decade and was "100% opposed" to his political ideology.
"My family wasn't given any notice [that] he was selected and [was] denied security the days after,” Walz wrote.
One person suggested Walz join former President Donald Trump on stage and endorse him to "save this country."
"I've thought hard about doing something like that!" Walz responded. "I'm torn between that and just keeping my family out of it." Walz went on to claim there were many stories he could recount about his younger brother, adding the Minnesoa governor was "not the type of character you want making decisions about your future." I wanna hear from Jeff Walz. pic.twitter.com/x0apoQRIH8
— Smokahontas (@Smokahontas2024) August 31, 2024
On Sunday, the elder Walz's remarks about his brother made The New York Post's cover page.
Trump later shared The Post's cover story and wrote: "Sounds like a really great guy!"
According to Federal Election Commission records, Walz previously donated $20 to Trump's initial 2016 presidential campaign, though did not appear to donate to his brother's political campaigns, indicating a preference for conservative politics.
After Trump was indicted by a Manhattan grand jury in March 2023, the elder Walz took to Facebook saying: "We've just become a third world banana republic."
Walz told the Post he was not participating in interviews at this time.
In the week since he was announced as Harris' running mate, Walz, a 24-year veteran, has faced an onslaught of criticism over the timing of his 2005 retirement from the military, which some have suggested was a calculated move to avoid his unit’s impending deployment to Iraq. Walz has further been accused of stolen valor for framing himself as a combat veteran despite never seeing combat during his service. Fellow veteran and Trump’s running mate Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance, who served in the U.S. Marine Corps from 2003 to 2007, similarly called out Walz’s record during a Sunday appearance on CNN. “He knew he was going to Iraq. He decided to quit,” Vance told host Dana Bash. “He lied about that. He said that, when he decided to retire, he did not know that he was going to Iraq. That is another untruth, as even his senior military officer said.” “I’m not criticizing the service. I’m criticizing the dishonesty — dishonesty spoken in favor and for the purpose of political benefit,” Vance asserted. In an Aug. 29 CNN interview, Bash asked Walz if he misspoke when he claimed to have carried weapons of war. Walz responded that he was proud of his service, as well as his work as a teacher and lawmaker. "I speak candidly, I wear my emotions on my sleeves, and I speak especially passionately about our children being shot in schools," he said. When Bash reiterated her question, Walz replied: "Yeah, I said, we were talking about, in this case, this was after a school shooting, the idea of carrying these weapons of war, and my wife, the English teacher, told me my grammar's not always correct."
