August 29, 2024

When Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz accepted the vice presidential nomination, his 17-year-old son, Gus Walz, began crying from the front row of the crowd while exclaiming, “That’s my dad!”

Conservative commentator Ann Coulter responded to the moment on X, writing “Talk about weird … ” Coulter deleted her post hours after she was criticized for being insensitive.

Walz did not respond to her X post. But a fake image on social media makes it look as if he did.

(Screengrab from Threads)

Walz and his wife, Gwen Walz, told People magazine in August that their son has a nonverbal learning disorder, an anxiety disorder and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder.

The purported response by Walz has no time stamp and is not on his official X account. Walz has not deleted any posts since Aug. 22, according to Social Blade, a social media analytics website.

A search of Google and the Nexis news database showed no credible news outlets reporting that Walz had responded to Coulter.

A Walz spokesperson did not immediately respond when asked whether the post was authentic.

We rate the claim that Walz insulted Coulter’s romantic history after she called his son “weird” False.

This fact check was originally published by PolitiFact, which is part of the Poynter Institute. See the sources for this fact check here.

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Sofia Ahmed is a contributing writer at PolitiFact based in New York City. She has previously worked at Reuters as a fact checker and immigration…
Sofia Ahmed

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