Hope Walz Says Republicans' Obsession With Old State Flag Is Like a Racist Rallying Cry

Sep 08, 2026 11:00 PM
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Hope Walz Says Republicans' Obsession With Old State Flag Is Like a Racist Rallying Cry
Minnesota Historical Society
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Hey, who wants to hear from Gov. Tim Walz's daughter, Hope? She says that Minnesota Republicans are so bad at politics that it's funny, but that's not what's on her mind. She was just at the Minnesota State Fair and was apparently triggered by Republicans flying the old, racist state flag, not the new one that looks suspiciously like the flag of the Puntland State of Somalia, where Rep. Ilhan Omar is from. 

As I reported back in 2023, Minnesota retired its state flag. As KARE 11 reported:

The new design follows calls to change the current Minnesota flag, which features the state seal on a field of blue. The seal shows a Native American riding off into the sunset while a white settler plows his field next to a rifle leaning on a nearby stump. Critics have called that imagery offensive for depicting a Native American being driven off the land.

It reminded me then of Land O'Lakes being faced with its problematic packaging, featuring a Native American woman. So what did Land O'Lakes do? It just made her disappear. 

This was the same year that The Washington Post ranked seven state flags that still had ties to the Confederacy, from least to most obvious. Least obvious was California's, which was favored by "Bear Flaggers," who "were proslavery Southerners who brought enslaved people with them, and others enslaved the Indigenous people there." Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina were also problematic. Minnesota didn't make the list.

The "critics" won out anyway, and Minnesota began the search for a new state flag and ended up with the Somalia lookalike.

As I reported this spring, the Minnesota city of Zumbrota was going to bring back the old state flag, "sparking a debate over heritage and politics." The mayor said it was a moot point anyway, as it would just be put in the corner of city council chambers.

Then Walz began to get serious. Minnesota Democrats proposed a bill that would cut aid to cities that refused to fly the new state flag.

In any case, Walz's daughter sees a racist rallying cry in the old flag.

Nose-piercing theory confirmed also.

Posting on social media about where the National Guard was going to be deployed.

The New York Times' editorial board's Mara Gay finds the American flag "just disturbing"; The View's Sunny Hostin said this July that neighborhoods with American flags make her feel unsafe, and Hope Walz finds Minnesota's old flag a racist rallying cry. Neither one blinks an eye when Antifa or Palestinian flags are paraded through the streets, though.

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News Topics MINNESOTA | TIM WALZ

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