Tim Walz appeared to make a quick getaway on Saturday when asked about the discovery of six hostages killed in the Gaza Strip.
The Minnesota governor was posed the question at the state fair in his home state of St. Paul, hours after the bodies were found in an underground tunnel in the Rafah area of the city.
It is not clear from the footage whether the potential vice president heard the question, but as soon as he said it, he waved goodbye to the audience.
The captives, identified Saturday as Carmel Gat, Eden Yerushalmi, Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Alexander Lobanov, Almog Sarusi and Master Sergeant Ori Danino, were among more than 200 captured by militants on Oct. 7.
Five of them were kidnapped at the Israeli music festival that was preparing for the attack and another from a nearby farming community. The IDF said they were all “brutally” killed “shortly” before troops were able to locate them.
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Tim Walz appeared to make a quick getaway on Saturday when asked about the discovery of six hostages killed in the Gaza Strip.
The six hostages (clockwise from top left): Alex Lobanov, Eden Yerushalmi, Almog Sarusi, Staff Sergeant Ori Danino, Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Carmel Gat
“What’s your reaction to the six hostages found in Gaza?” the unseen journalist asks in the clip, which shows Walz holding a milkshake as he makes the rounds during his brief visit to the 12-day event.
At that point, a member of the politician’s staff appears to signal to him that it is time to leave, prompting Walz to announce his departure.
“Very well, thank you all!” he tells the crowd, before leaving to a round of applause.
Accompanied by his wife, Gwen, and daughter Hope, the politician was quickly surrounded by a security team before being whisked away.
At another point during his visit, the 60-year-old nibbled on a pork chop on a stick, a local delicacy.
“For those of you who aren’t from Minnesota, just to be clear, there are a lot of great state fairs in the country, this is the best one,” Walz told reporters, in another informal exchange.
“I can say I’ve had pork chops in Iowa,” he joked.
“I’m very happy to have been able to spend a day here.”
It was not clear from the footage whether the potential vice president heard the question, but as soon as he said it, he waved goodbye to viewers.
Walz is seen eating street food at the event alongside his daughter Hope (left) and wife Gwen (right). He did not answer any policy questions during his brief visit.
Sharing a video of himself eating street food at the festival frequented by local farmers, he posted on Twitter: ‘Breakfast of champions: pork chop on a stick.’
During his visit, Walz also repeatedly highlighted his state’s agricultural sector, as local ranchers and landowners defended their products.
In total, he spent about an hour there, before leaving for a planned meeting with union leaders in Milwaukee on Monday.
Staying away from topics like politics, he told a local media outlet newsmpr how he has balanced his role as governor amid his and Harris’s whirlwind campaigns. “I have a good team that can manage my schedule,” he told viewers.
Meanwhile, abroad, the bodies of the long-missing hostages were found.
A senior Hamas official, Izzat al-Rishq, insisted that Israel was responsible for their deaths as it has refused to sign a ceasefire agreement.
A group representing the hostages’ families echoed these sentiments on Saturday, demanding that Netanyahu “address the nation and take responsibility for abandoning the hostages.”
“The delay in signing the agreement has led to his death and that of many other hostages,” they wrote.
Late last week, Walz and his running mate, Kamala Harris, stopped short of saying they would alter Biden’s policy on arms sales to Israel, a sticking point for some voters. Neither has commented on the recent overseas discovery.
They said the six captives were “killed in recent days, after surviving nearly 11 months of abuse, torture and starvation in Hamas captivity.”
Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Saturday that Israel will not rest until those responsible are brought to justice.
“Those who kill hostages do not want an agreement,” he declared.
The IDF added that the location where the bodies were discovered was just over half a mile from a tunnel where another hostage was rescued alive days earlier, two days after Walz appeared alongside his running mate Kamala Harris for an interview on CNN.
During the interview, both men stopped short of saying they would change Biden’s policy on arms sales to Israel, a sticking point for some voters.
Despite expressing her desire for some policy changes, Harris said her policy on arming Israel would not change if elected president.
In the days since then, neither of them has commented on the recent discovery.
