Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz

By Josh Lanier From Daily Voice

Tim Walz called it a slur that should never be repeated. Now, he hears it all day.

The Minnesota governor, on Thursday, Dec. 4, said people have been driving by his home and screaming the r-slur — a word used to malign those with intellectual disabilities — since President Donald Trump called him that in a social media post last week.

"This creates danger," the embattled governor said, discussing Republican rhetoric. "... I've never seen this before: people driving by my house and using the R-word in front of people. This is shameful, and I have yet to see an elected official — a Republican elected official — say you're right, that's shameful."

Walz said he believes it's a slippery slope from name-calling to something more serious.

"We know how these things go," he said. "It starts with taunts; they turn to violence."

This round of name-calling began just before Thanksgiving, when the president made multiple posts to social media. In one screed decrying Somali immigrants, Trump called Walz “the seriously re----ed Governor of Minnesota, Tim Walz," claiming the governor was ineffective because of "fear, incompetence, or both.”

Trump has increasingly used harsher attacks and language against his political opponents in recent weeks. He shared a debunked rumor that Rep. Ilhan Omar, a Somali immigrant who represents parts of Minneapolis, had married her brother.

At a Cabinet meeting at the White House on Tuesday, Dec. 2, the president called Somali immigrants "garbage" that have "destroyed our country." He continued that they "contribute nothing" and reused a racist rallying cry to "send them back" to the "hell hole" they came from.

Trump has made removing immigrants from the United States a centerpiece of his administration, but his anger toward them intensified following the shooting of two U.S. National Guard members in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 26.

Army Spc. Sarah Beckstrom, 20, was killed in the attack, and another West Virginia guardsman was critically injured.

Rahmanullah Lakanwal, a 29-year-old Afghan refugee who had been allowed into the United States in 2021 because he worked with the U.S. military and CIA during the war in Afghanistan, is accused of the shooting.