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Karl Rove Surprisingly Defends ‘Knucklehead’ Tim Walz on Fox News

GOP stalwart Karl Rove gave the governor of Minnesota some earnest advice about how to move on from his misstatements.

Karl Rove offered Democratic vice-presidential candidate Tim Walz some interview tips during a segment on Fox News Channel—and made a surprising case for the Minnesota governor and his running mate Vice President Kamala Harris in the process.

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During the Friday segment, Fox News anchor John Roberts played a clip of ABC’s Michael Strahan asking Walz what he would say to people who don’t trust the Minnesota governor given his past misstatements.

Walz replied, “I know that things get spun in a political environment. But I think what they see is, if they want to compare that talking about immigration policy or seeing the things Donald Trump would say, I think there’s a big difference than missing a date when you’re there, and again spinning something for political reasons.”

After the clip, Roberts mocked the Minnesota governor for being a self-described “knucklehead.” But instead of joining him, Rove offered a better answer to the question—and a defense of Walz.

“If just he simply said, ‘Look, I’ve misspoken and I apologize for it. I understand—I have been informed by my experiences, but yes, I have mangled dates and put myself in places I wasn’t, but it was unintentional and I wasn’t trying to mislead. You know, I am proud of my record as a member of Congress, as governor of an important state. But yeah, have I mis-spoken? You bet. And for that I’m sorry,’” Rove said.

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He also called Walz a “highly entertaining candidate” and advised him to, “Move on. People are forgiving, but you have to admit a problem.”

Earlier in the segment, he also offered a better answer than Walz’s on the question of why Harris didn’t enact her campaign policy proposals during her time in the White House serving under President Joe Biden.

Walz’s answer focused on Trump killing a bipartisan immigration bill, but Rove thought he should have defended his running mate before attacking her opponent.

“There is an answer, which is to say, ‘Look, she was the vice president. Times change, and four years ago she and President Biden were trying to help the country recover from COVID. That’s been done so what’s the next chapter that we need to work on? That’s why we want to do x,y and z.’”

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