Tim Walz was put on the spot mid-way through Tuesday’s VP debate, with CBS moderators pressing him on why he’s claimed to have been in Hong Kong amid the infamous Tiananmen Square protests when he wasn’t.
Walz offered up a long answer on his small-town upbringing and his educational ties to China before eventually conceding, “I’m a knucklehead at times.”
He then offered a vague acknowledgement that he’d fibbed a bit: “Many times I will talk a lot. I will get caught up in the rhetoric.”
The Tiananmen Square protests and massacre took place in spring 1989, a few months before Walz arrived in Hong Kong for the first time in August.
Walz claimed to have been in China amid the massacre multiple times, with the most recent instance coming on a podcast in February. Walz said then that he’d been in Hong Kong, then a British colony, “when Tiananmen happened.”
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The aftermath of the protests and massacre at Tiananmen Square in 1989. Estimates have placed the death toll from from several hundred to several thousand.
David Turnley/Getty Images
The Tiananmen Square protests were student-led demonstrations in Beijing against corruption and inflation, with the events turning deadly after the Chinese government cracked down on protesters. Estimates of the death toll vary from several hundred to several thousand, while hundreds of others were injured.
Walz has been criticized for a string of embellishments he’s made over the years regarding his record. His old claims have since been scrutinized intensely since he joined Kamala Harris’ ticket, but he hadn’t had to answer for the lies on a national stage before Tuesday.
Walz also hasn’t spoken about his time in China at length since August, but was able to share a bit in primetime on Tuesday. He explained he’d not been perfect, referencing his Tiananmen Square fib, and explained that he chose to travel to China so he could better understand the world.
“So this is about trying to understand the world,” Walz said. “It’s about trying to do the best you can for your community, and then it’s putting yourself out there and letting your folks understand what it is.
The Minnesota governor added: “My commitment, whether it be through teaching, which I was good at, or whether it was being a good soldier, or being a good member of Congress, those are the things that I think—those are the values that people care about.”
