Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, Democratic candidate for vice president, made a series of false claims about his visits to China, reports show, exaggerating both the number and significance of his visits to the country. Those exaggerations came back to bite him during the vice presidential debate on Tuesday, where he was confronted over his claim to have been in China during the Tiananmen Square Massacre. Walz was forced to admit that he had not been in the country at the time, saying that he misspoke and that he can “get caught up in rhetoric.”

Walz claimed to have been in China during the famous May 1989 protests and the subsequent crackdown by the Chinese government multiple times, including on a radio interview in 2019. But investigation by Minnesota Public Radio uncovered a photo of Walz taken on May 16 of that year, which showed that during the time he was working at a National Guard Armory in Nebraska. He did go to China later that same year, in August, but this was well after the events of Tiananmen Square were over.



Walz later married his wife, Gwen, on June 4, 1994, the fifth anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Massacre, and they spent their honeymoon in China leading an educational trip for students. Gwen told the Nebraska newspaper Star-Herald that the wedding date was chosen by Walz because “he wanted to have a date he’ll always remember.”

Walz has also claimed that he visited China over 30 times, but his campaign recently confirmed that this was an exaggeration. The real number, it stated, was closer to 15.

The close ties Walz has with China has brought him under scrutiny from the House Oversight Committee, which subpoenaed the Department of Homeland Security on Monday after a whistleblower claimed the department had concerns regarding Walz’s relationship with the Chinese Communist Party. Walz reportedly praised the communist approach of the Chinese government during at least one of his history classes in 1991, when he was a social studies teacher.