OAN Staff Brooke Mallory
6:29 PM – Tuesday, January 20, 2026
A series of recent disclosures has offered a glimpse into the strange vetting process behind the 2024 Democrat vice-presidential selection.
According to a CNN report, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz (D-Minn.) was specifically asked by then-Vice President Kamala Harris’ team whether he had ever served as an agent for the Chinese communist government.
This follows similar revelations from Governor Josh Shapiro (D-Penn.), who detailed in his 2025 memoir being questioned about potential status as a foreign agent for Israel, given his pro-Zionist views and Jewish heritage. As the first Jewish governor of Pennsylvania, Shapiro admitted to being surprised and slightly offended by the query.
Meanwhile, the scrutiny regarding Walz reportedly stems from his extensive history with China, which spans over three decades.
In 1989, immediately following the Tiananmen Square protests, Walz traveled to Foshan in the Guangdong province. He was part of the first group of American educators sent to the region through WorldTeach, a non-profit program then affiliated with Harvard University’s Institute for International Development.
Upon his return to the United States, he and his wife, Gwen, also established Educational Travel Adventures, a private company that organized annual summer trips to China for American high school students. These frequent excursions, totaling approximately 30 trips, became a focal point for investigators and Republican opponents alike.
While Walz has described these efforts as cultural exchange programs designed to foster global citizenship, the sheer volume of his travel and his past praise for the Chinese people’s hospitality provided the basis for the “foreign influence” inquiries during his rise to the national stage.
The trips to China also became a focal point for Republicans during the campaign for obvious reasons related to national security.
President Donald Trump and Republican officials have frequently characterized Walz as “dangerously sympathetic” to the interests of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), arguing that his extensive history and professed admiration of the country would compromise his ability to put American interests first.
- Congressional Inquiries: These criticisms and concerns were culminated in formal letters from Republican leadership demanding access to Walz’s travel records and communications, describing his past work as a potential national security vulnerability.
- The “Manchurian Candidate”: When referencing Walz, opponents have frequently invoked the “Manchurian candidate” trope, a reference to the Cold War-era thriller, to suggest that Walz’s time in China had left him susceptible to ideological grooming or clandestine influence.
- Focus on State Funding: Critics, including members of the House Oversight Committee, pointed to Walz’s past praise for the Chinese educational system and his role in organizing trips that were, in some instances, partially subsidized by the Chinese government as evidence of a perceived conflict of interest.
Nonetheless, Walz’s office argues that he has been entirely transparent about his travels, and the vetting process ultimately concluded that his history posed no security risk.
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