A new report from Politico has suggested that former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had a major part in Vice President Kamala Harris’s selection of Minnesota Governor Tim Walz to be her running mate, due to his strong ties to the lower chamber. 

As Somali refugees in Minnesota waged gang wars and engaged in child sex trafficking, Governor Tim Walz pushed for even more refugees to be resettled in his state. Walz, whom Vice President Kamala Harris tapped as her running mate this week, petitioned the Trump administration to send more refugees to Minnesota in 2019, even though the state already had the highest number of refugees per capita in the United States. The call came as Somali refugees, a large and growing population in Minnesota, engaged in gang warfare, child sex trafficking, and later, hundreds of millions of dollars of fraud. “Minnesota has a strong moral tradition of welcoming those who seek refuge. Our state has always stepped forward to help those who are fleeing desperate situations and need a safe place to call home,” Walz wrote in a letter to then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. “I offer my consent to continue refugee resettlement in the State of Minnesota.” Walz’s request was a response to former President Donald Trump’s move to allow states and localities to deny increased refugee resettlement in their communities. Walz, who had previously pushed for Minnesota to become a sanctuary state, has a long record of supporting unfettered immigration. His record on immigration has come under increased scrutiny after Harris named him to the Democratic presidential ticket. “Refugees strengthen our communities. Bringing new cultures and fresh perspectives, they contribute to the social fabric of our state,” Walz said in his letter to Pompeo. But Somali refugees brought more than fresh perspectives to Minnesota. Since at least 2009, members of Minneapolis’s Somali refugee community have formed gangs along the same clan lines that plunged Somalia into civil war. Members of the gangs — many of whom fled Somalia to escape clan warfare — engaged in what appeared to be targeted murders against one another. In 2008 the Minneapolis Police Department created a special Somali Liaison position in an attempt to stem the violence. In 2012, authorities uncovered a Somali child sex trafficking ring operating out of Minneapolis and St. Paul, as well as Columbus, Ohio and Nashville, Tennessee. Multiple girls under the age of 14 had been forced into prostitution by three different Somali gangs, resulting in the 30 different defendants — many of whom were allowed into the United States as refugees — being charged by federal authorities. Violence between rival Somali gangs has continued to plague Minnesota in recent years, particularly in Minneapolis’ Cedar-Riverside neighborhood, now referred to as “Little Mogadishu.” Violent crime in the area soared a whopping 56 percent in 2018, with authorities attributing the rise to gangs like the Somali Outlaws, the Somali Mafia, the Hot Boyz, and Madhibaan with Attitude. A YouTube personality visited Minneapolis this year to document the gang warfare interviewed a bail bondsman and bounty hunter who said that “Somali gangs are taking over.” During Walz’s tenure, Somali migrants in Minnesota defrauded the government out of a quarter of a billion taxpayer dollars intended to feed impoverished children. Nearly 50 defendants created a fraudulent organization called “Feeding Our Future,” and multiple subsidiary organizations that defrauded $250 million from a coronavirus relief program. Only $50 million of those funds have been recovered. Somalis were the largest refugee population in the North Star State as of 2023. The overall number of refugees set to be resettled in 2024 is expected to surge from 1,500 to 2,400. Over 13,000 Somali refugees were accepted into Minnesota between 2005 and 2018, and the state had 69,000 Somali residents as of 2019, accounting for about 40 percent of all Somalis residing in the entire United States. Recent public opinion surveys have found that immigration is one of the most important issues for voters heading into the November election, and that an increasing share of Americans are in favor of slashing immigration and ramping up mass deportations.

Social media flooded with pictures of veterans serving the country following reports of Democrat Vice Presidential nominee Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz ducking combat in Iraq. On Wednesday on X, posts that read, “me not being Tim Walz” went viral with veterans from the various branches of the U.S. military posting pictures of them deployed around the world. The pictures take place in the air in cockpits, war-torn countries, next to armored vehicles on the battlefield, and so much more. Vets, post your photo of you not being Tim Walz! pic.twitter.com/OWROmYPlS4 — Kurt Schlichter (@KurtSchlichter) August 7, 2024 One of the posts had three pictures and read, “Here’s a photo of me not being Tim Walz! (Last photo is me on a call with my daughter while in Afghanistan for 4 years) Another one that generated a lot of attention read, “I’m not upset that Tim Walz was too scared to deploy to a combat zone.  The issue is he abandoned his guys mere weeks before the deployment, and then he lied about being a combat vet to pass gun control.  This is unforgivable.” Here’s a photo of me not being Tim Walz! (Last photo is me on a call with my daughter while in Afghanistan for 4 years) pic.twitter.com/DvI0lDhHIT — ? Dave Swingle ? (@davekswingle) August 7, 2024 While a third person wrote, “Here’s my National Guard son in the armored cav in Iraq not being Tim Walz.” The posts followed reports that Walz abruptly retired from the military after being notified that his unit was set to be deployed to Iraq. When Walz was running for Governor in 2018, former members of the National Guard spoke out about his service, with a retired command sergeant major saying he “embellished and selectively omitted facts of his military career for years,” as previously reported. In an open letter posted to Facebook that year, retired Command Sergeants Major Thomas Behrends and Paul Herr wrote that Walz retired just a few months after receiving a warning order that his battalion would be deployed to Iraq – even though he told military personnel he would be going on the mission. “On May 16th, 2005, [Walz] quit, betraying his country, leaving the 1-125th Field Artillery Battalion and its Soldiers hanging; without its senior Non-Commissioned Officer, as the battalion prepared for war,” Behrends and Herr wrote. The pair wrote that Walz said he needed to retire to run for Congress, but this was untrue. Walz could have run for Congress and requested permission from the Secretary of Defense before he entered active duty, the pair claimed, noting that his official retirement document says “soldier not available for signature.” Ashe Schow contributed to this piece. Related: Walz ‘Embellished And Selectively Omitted Facts’ About His Military Career: Retired National Guardsmen

Virginia this week removed more than 6,300 non-citizens from the state’s voter rolls as part of election security measures spearheaded by Gov. Glenn Youngkin. On Wednesday, Youngkin signed an executive order instructing the Department of Elections to remove “non-citizens who may have purposefully or accidentally registered to vote.” Pursuant to the order, the state also identified and removed from voter rolls 79,867 deceased voters, and identified registered voters who had moved out of state. “The Virginia model for Election Security works. This isn’t a Democrat or Republican issue, it’s an American and Virginian issue,” Youngkin said in a statement. “Every legal vote deserves to be counted without being watered down by illegal votes or inaccurate machines.” Virginia does not require voters to present identification at the polls, which allows unregistered voters to impersonate deceased individuals or others on the voter rolls. Youngkin’s executive order notes that it is essential for different agencies’ jurisdictions to work together to ensure clean elections. Virginia identified non-citizens using information submitted to the Department of Motor Vehicles cross-referenced with Department of Homeland Security and Social Security information. Virginia entered into comprehensive data-sharing agreements with seven states and, has received data from 42 states. Other states could have a harder time purging non-citizens from voter rolls, however, because “Virginia is one of only three states in the nation that require those registering to vote to provide their full 9-digit social security number.” Youngkin’s efforts to secure elections come after the Democrat-controlled legislature created extended early voting periods and mail-in voting. Youngkin said drop boxes are “under 24/7 monitoring,” but still called for “strengthening state and federal law.” His executive order said that absentee ballots must only be mailed when requested by a voter, and that returned absentee ballots cannot be counted unless “the last four digits of a voter’s social security number and year of birth provided on the envelope are matched to the voter’s record in the statewide voter registration system.” The order also requires the Department of Motor Vehicles to generate a daily file of non-citizen transactions, and instructs local registrars to notify county prosecutors when they become aware of an illegal immigrant’s attempt to register to vote. The order made clear that Virginia’s Attorney General “has full authority to enforce election laws,” and that the state will use only paper ballots going forward. “In Virginia, we don’t play games, and our model for election security is working,” Youngkin said.