Democrat vice presidential candidate Tim Walz is just getting started on the national stage, but he found it to be a bumpy road, as social media is abuzz from a clip that has gone viral on social media.
"She simply has said it doesn't have to be this way: It doesn’t have to be this way; we can't afford we can't afford four more years of this," Walz told his Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, campaign rally Saturday, referring initially to fear-mongering, but widely taken literally by backers of President Donald Trump to be homage to his long-standing warnings on rising costs from inflation under President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.
"And I've been saying it."
Walz quickly shifted to the debunked Project 2025 narrative, long disavowed by Trump but something Harris and Walz repeatedly try to tie to him. Project 2025 is an agenda platform presented by the Heritage Foundation, but the only candidates using it in this campaign are the Democrats trying to blame Trump for its most conservative ideals.
Trump repeatedly says he is more "common sense" than conservative and definitely not the radical the left attempts to paint him to be.
"'We can't afford four more years of this' shouts running mate of candidate who has been leading the country for four years," The Babylon Bee headline read, mocking Walz's gaffe.
Other prominent Trump backers applauded Walz's "honesty."
"True," former Wisconsin GOP Gov. Scott Walker wrote on X.
"I'm with Him/Tim," Donald Trump Jr. wrote, trolling Democrats for their long-mocked pronouns agenda and former Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign slogan.
"WALZ FINALLY TELLS THE TRUTH: 'We can't afford four more years' of Kamala Harris," Trump War Room wrote, trolling Walz on his myriad stories of having embellished his past, including his retired military rank that he lost because he left his unit before it assigned to war-time duty Iraq.
"Tim Walz: 'We can't afford four more years of this.' Amen," wrote Trump 2020 campaign manager Tim Murtaugh.
The quote is verbatim to a long repeated Trump campaign rally warning on rising costs, inflation and open borders — even if Walz was struggling to make the case against four more years of a Trump administration that expired officially on Jan. 6, 2021.