Gay student says “Coach” Tim Walz protected him from homophobic bullies

While introducing Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) as her running mate to a rally audience of 14,000 in Philadelphia yesterday evening, Vice President Kamala Harris noted that, while working as a high school teacher and football coach back in 1999, Walz advised the school’s first gay-straight alliance (GSA) to help LGBTQ+ students, making “the school a safe place for everybody,” Harris said.

At the rally, Harris noted that Walz worked for a decade as a social studies teacher and football coach at Mankato West High School. During his time there, he helped the “winless” football team win a state championship, Harris said, using football to teach his players life lessons. But “Tim wasn’t only a role model on the football field,’ Harris said.

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“Around that same time, Coach Walz was approached by a student in his social studies class. The young man was one of the first openly gay students at the school and was hoping to start a Gay Straight Alliance at a time, at a time when acceptance was difficult to find for LGBTQ students,” Harris said. “Tim knew the message that it would send to have a football coach get involved. So he signed up to be the group’s faculty advisor, and as students have said, he made the school a safe place for everybody.”

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At a time when acceptance was hard to find for LGBTQ+ students, @Tim_Walz knew the signal it would send for a football coach to get involved in the Gay Straight Alliance.

So he signed on to be the group’s faculty advisor.

— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) August 6, 2024

In a previous video interview, Walz said, “I had students come to me who were concerned that there was an uptick in some bullying towards our gay and lesbian students, and this is in the mid 90s. They asked if I would be interested in helping start a gay-straight alliance group. My answer was ‘Absolutely.'”

“I recognized my responsibility in that you have an older, white, straight, married male football coach who’s deeply concerned that these students are treated fairly and that there’s no bullying,” he added. “And the idea that my players would be interested in coming to that and learn and to speak, to create a culture in a school that was welcoming, open and understanding was something Gwen [my wife] and I always strove for.”

Jacob Reitan, a gay student who was bullied at the high school during Walz’s time teaching there, said, “Both Tim and Gwen were incredibly supportive of their gay students. They modeled values of inclusivity and respect that helped not just me — I was bullied in high school — but it also, I think, helped the bully. It showed the bully a better path forward.”

Reitan added, “I can think of no one better than Tim Walz to show that better path forward for America. We have had with President Trump, a bully president. It’s a one-act show with this president, all he knows how to do is the politics of the bully. Tim Walz will show us a better way forward. He’s been showing and modeling that better way forward for me all the way back to 1997.”

At the rally, Harris added that, in the high school yearbook, the students voted Walz as the “most inspiring faculty member.”

“Walz was the kind of teacher and mentor that every child in America dreams of having, and that every kid deserves the kind of coach, because he’s the kind of person who makes people feel like they belong, and then inspires them to dream big,” Harris said. “And that’s the kind of vice president he will be.”

Walz has continued his support for LGBTQ+ students, championing inclusive school policies, gender-affirming care for trans youth, trans inclusion in sports, and opposing both so-called conversion therapy as well as bans on LGBTQ+-inclusive books.

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