Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz rallied before a few hundred spectators at Pittsburgh’s Acrisure Stadium on Tuesday, Oct. 15, 2024. Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential candidate, and her running mate, Walz, have been blanketing Pennsylvania, a key swing state in the 2024 presidential race. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

PITTSBURGH — Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz urged a crowd of Pittsburgh Steelers fans to vote early as he rallied a few hundred of them Tuesday night at the professional football team’s home at Acrisure Stadium.

Vice President Kamala Harris’ Democratic presidential running mate campaigned in the southwestern Pennsylvania city as the campaign continues its blitz of the coveted swing state that could decide the 2024 presidential contest.

The race between Harris and former President Donald Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, remains razor-thin in the Keystone State.

Former Steeler Will Allen introduced Walz to a cheering crowd dotted with Steelers hats, jerseys and Terrible Towels, the team’s official rally towel.

“Give me my moment here, yesterday I made my first trip to Lambeau Field,” Walz said, referring to his trip to Green Bay, Wisconsin, and the home of the Green Bay Packers football team. “Today, I’m making my first trip into Steeler territory, so thank you.”

The former high school football coach and teacher visited Wisconsin Monday, which is alongside Pennsylvania on the list of must-win swing states. The others include Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada and North Carolina.

Early mail-in ballot voting is already underway in Pennsylvania.

“If you’re voting by mail, get the damn thing in the mail as soon as possible,” Walz said.

Harris campaigned in Erie, Pennsylvania, Monday night before heading to Michigan Tuesday.

Attacks on Trump

Like Harris did in the state’s northwestern corner the previous night, Walz roused the Pittsburgh crowd by attacking Trump’s mental fitness.

“I would not usually encourage this, but go watch this guy, watch his town hall. He stopped taking questions and stood frozen on stage for 30 minutes while they played his Spotify list,” Walz said, referring to Trump’s Monday night town hall outside of Philadelphia.

“If this were your grandfather, you would take the keys away,” Walz said to laughter. “And I tell you this, look, it would be funny if this guy weren’t running for president of the United States.”

In Erie, Harris warned that Trump is “unhinged” and played video clips of the former president explaining his potential plans to use the military to silence “the enemy from within.”

Trump wrote on his social media platform Tuesday morning that Harris’ own health report is “really bad.”

“With all of the problems that she has, there is a real question as to whether or not she should be running for President!” he wrote on Truth Social.

Harris’ medical report released Saturday describes her “in excellent health.”

Walz on the farm

While Walz wore a white shirt and sports jacket when talking to the football fans, earlier in the day he donned a flannel shirt and told supporters gathered outside a barn in Lawrence County that he and Harris would fight for American farmers and resources for rural residents.

The governor also highlighted his bona fides as a veteran, hunter and gun owner. His speech can be viewed in full on C-SPAN.

The Harris-Walz campaign released a plan Tuesday for rural America that promised to shore up rural health care and support small farms.

Walz also stopped at a garden center and cafe in Butler County before heading into the city.

The pro-Democrat Rural USA political action committee highlighted economic analyses Tuesday that show Trump’s promised tariffs would cause farmers to lose business as exports would decline.

Pennsylvania farmers could lose $111 million in soy exports, $50 million in corn exports, $22 million in beef exports and $20 million in wheat exports, according to the analysis from the University of Illinois Department of Agriculture and Consumer Economics.

“These new studies literally show that Trump’s tariffs will put Pennsylvania farmers out of business,” Chris Gibbs, an Ohio corn and soybean farmer and president of Rural Voices USA, said in a statement Tuesday. “Exports are vital for Pennsylvania farmers and they cannot absorb the sharp fall in exports and prices these studies foreshadow.”

Trump defended his tariff proposals at the Economic Club of Chicago earlier Tuesday.  He told Bloomberg Editor-in-Chief John Micklethwait during an hour-long interview that he would spur a manufacturing boom in the U.S. by making tariffs “so high, so horrible, so obnoxious” that companies would relocate.

Republican vice presidential nominee Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio is scheduled to campaign in Pittsburgh Thursday.

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Former Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre, seen here in an NFL photo from 2006, announced in congressional testimony that he has Parkinson's disease, possibly related to his many concussions. He was discussing a scandal in Mississippi involving the transfer of millions of dollars in funds meant for poor families to help pay for a volleyball stadium that was a pet project of Favre. Getty Images photo. (Mark Konezny | NFLPhotoLibrary)

In a moment that sent shockwaves through the sports world, Hall of Fame quarterback – and Green Bay Packers legend – Brett Favre revealed that he was suffering from the neurological disease known as Parkinson’s. In front of a U.S. congressional committee, Favre was testifying about a business scandal that has dealt his reputation a major blow in recent years. Favre had been the top investor in a drug company called Prevacus. The shady firm was handed $2 million in welfare funds from the state of Mississippi. In July, Prevacus’ founder Jacob VanLandingham confessed to using this welfare money to pay his gambling debts and pled guilty to wire fraud. Favre has been blamed for also profiting from this theft, a charge he strongly denies.

Favre’s congressional testimony produced emotional whiplash as, within his opening remarks about this grubby caper, he revealed his shattering diagnosis. “Sadly, I also lost an investment in a company that I believed was developing a breakthrough concussion drug I thought would help others,” Favre said. “And I’m sure you’ll understand why it’s too late for me, because I’ve recently been diagnosed with Parkinson’s. This is also a cause dear to my heart.”

The announcement, while tragic and shocking, was also not surprising. Parkinson’s disease can be spurred by excessive blows to the head, traumatic brain injuries, or repeated concussions. Perhaps the most prominent sufferer of Parkinson’s was the boxer who late in his career took punches like no other: Muhammad Ali. Favre played football like the older Ali: repeatedly pummeled yet always coming back for more. No one is close to Favre’s record 297 games started in a row. That’s not just a number for quarterbacks: that’s all players. In Favre’s time, unlike today, shots to the QB’s head or driving him into the turf was legal and lauded. In a 2018 Today Show interview, Favre says that while playing, he was diagnosed with “only” three or four concussions but also commented, “When you have ringing of the ears, seeing stars, that’s a concussion. And if that is a concussion, I’ve had hundreds, maybe thousands, throughout my career, which is frightening.”

There will be apologists for the game who will no doubt say that one cannot “blame football” for Favre’s condition. They sound like the tobacco company executives disavowing any connection between smoking and lung cancer. In a wide-ranging survey produced by Boston University, the forefront institution on concussion research, people who suffered traumatic brain injuries were 61% more likely to develop Parkinson’s. That is staggering. The National Football League and their feckless commissioner Roger Goodell would be wise to get in front of this, to not play the role of clueless tobacco executive, and speak to the league’s funding efforts to find new treatments. They should articulate how they are trying to make the game safer. They should take accountability for the fact that their sport can have horrific outcomes.

This announcement could also mark an inflection point for Favre. For even his most die-hard fans — and he has legions — it has been exhausting to laud this person as any kind of athletic hero. He has, under a bright public eye, displayed myriad flaws. There were the pill addictions, the attempted infidelities, and now most shamefully, accusations that Mississippi’s favorite son was stealing funds meant for the state’s poorest residents. But Favre always kept a loyal following from people – particularly in Wisconsin – who will always appreciate how he laid it all on the line week after week with a boyish, daredevil grin. They adore the player more than the man, but when these categories inevitably spill over, they are fine with the contradictions because he has their hearts: his flaws are just part of what makes him human. 

Now Favre gets to be the suffering saint of football: a great quarterback brought down by the game he played like a little kid in the backyard. He can be a receiver of sympathy instead of a source of shame. Favre will undoubtedly be offered support from all corners. If there is one thing we have learned about Parkinson’s, even with new treatments being developed, he is truly going to need it. 

This commentary is published as a joint project of the Wisconsin Examiner and The Progressive magazine.