Monday morning’s announcement from Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz that he would end his bid for an unprecedented third term as governor is an occasion for celebration.
While presenting himself as a fatherly Midwestern figure—with all the attendant folksiness one associates with the “Minnesota Nice” aura—Walz’s tenure was an unvarnished tragedy of serious moral consequence. His administration combined gross mismanagement with garish moral commitments. His decision to bow out of the race signals a long-overdue opportunity for Minnesota to reclaim a measure of moral sanity.
A brief review of what transpired under Walz is sufficient to demonstrate the level of moral disaster he oversaw. During the George Floyd riots, Walz proved himself the definition of an empty suit—mouthing platitudes drenched in the language of Critical Race Theory while allowing Minneapolis to descend into chaos marked by deadly and costly unrest. Friends of mine attest to the resulting surge in violent crime that made life in Minnesota’s largest cities precarious and increasingly unlivable.
Beyond his symbolic failure during a moment like 2020—when Minnesota sat at the center of global attention—Walz’s progressive agenda on human dignity and family life stands nearly unrivaled in its extremism. He oversaw the expansion of barbaric abortion policies, most notably the enactment of the so-called “Protect Reproductive Options Act,” which enshrined abortion for “pregnant persons” as a constitutional right in Minnesota. The law permits children who survive abortion procedures to be left to die.
Walz also signed legislation designating Minnesota as a so-called transgender “sanctuary state,” enabling individuals seeking gender transitions to flee their home states for refuge—particularly minors who leave their parents’ homes. The law further authorizes the state to remove children from the custody of parents who refuse to affirm a child’s desire to transition to a different gender. Though it seems dystopic that something as morally repugnant as this could pass, we should understand Walz’s actions as nothing less than an assault on parental rights.
The political death knell of Walz’s tenure appears to have been the exposure of a massive fraud scheme involving Somali immigrants in his state. The abuses of taxpayer funds were so egregious that even The New York Times reported on the fraud, waste, and abuse the Walz administration permitted. That same administration refused to eliminate the corruption and fraud—at least partly out of fear of accusations of racism and the loss of a politically important constituency.
The Minnesota fraud scheme perpetrated by Somali immigrants stands as a five-alarm case study in the confluence of progressive governance under Walz: permissive immigration without assimilation, racialized politics, bureaucratic mismanagement, toxic empathy posing as compassion, and a welfare state allergic to accountability.
Leaving the political calculations to the pundit class, the moral significance of Walz’s exit is unmistakable. His administration was a persistent violator of God’s moral law in its gravest forms. His worldview is incompatible with the political common good, as it systematically undermines the conditions necessary for human flourishing—namely, the foundation of human dignity, the protection of the natural family unit, and a sound trust in the rule of law.
Walz championed and put into effect some of the most morally depraved policies in the United States: extreme assaults on unborn life, the aggressive advance of gender ideology, and direct threats to parental authority. His governorship—now mercifully in its final year—offers Minnesota a chance at moral reset. Praise God that a young man in his twenties, Nick Shirley, armed with an iPhone and an X account, played a decisive role in ending Walz’s political career by exposing the depths of Somali fraud that occurred under his tenure.
I cannot end this column without mentioning what could have been. Had Kamala Harris’s running mate in 2024, Tim Walz, ascended to national office, Americans would now be experiencing the scourge of his malignant policies nationwide. We narrowly avoided seeing Walz elevated to the vice presidency, a prospect for which I sincerely thank God we were spared.
While Christians are called to honor the office of the magistrate (1 Timothy 2:1-2), this does not mandate honoring the individual who occupies that office. Tim Walz is a wicked magistrate in the spirit of Ahab and Herod. Above all, he betrayed his constituents by betraying his call as a magistrate meant to do justice on God’s terms, not progressive counterfeits (Romans 13:1-7). As Christians, let us pray that while out of office, Tim Walz comes to his senses, repents, and comes to know the Lord Jesus Christ with a genuine saving faith. Even still, his departure from office—and, one hopes, from public life altogether—constitutes a moral reprieve from the sustained assault he has waged against God’s created order. Good riddance.
This article originally appeared at WORLD Opinions on January 7, 2026.
