Does a video show Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz "flipping off" a heckler at a Michigan football game? No, that's not true: A still photo taken at the same event shows that Walz was pointing his index finger at bystanders. His middle digit remained firmly folded in his hand.
The claim appeared in a video on X (archived here) by conservative activist Charlie Kirk on September 29, 2024. The caption read:
Tim Walz gets heckled by students at the Michigan game and then appears to flip off the students. Really showing his ex-teacher, vice presidential maturity getting rattled by some college kids. Weak!
This is how the post looked on X at the time of writing:
(Source: X screenshot taken on Tue Oct 1 2024 14:18:23 UTC)
The four-second video shows Walz attending a football game between the University of Michigan and the University of Minnesota, the state where Walz is governor, on September 28, 2024. As he walks by the stands with his security detail, a heckler yells "Trump 2024, baby!" Walz can be seen sticking out a finger on his right hand midway through the taunt.
The grainy quality and short duration of Kirk's video makes it difficult to tell which digit Walz is extending. However, a still photo shot from a different angle, posted on Walz's official Instagram account on September 29, 2024, clearly shows Walz was pointing with his index finger, as if to acknowledge the crowd as he passes by:
(Source: Instagram screenshot taken on Tue Oct 1 2024 17:52:11 UTC)
This photo of Walz was taken at the same time and place as the video that appears in Kirk's X post. Walz's clothing and hat are the same, the security official on his left is wearing his blue jacket closed, the security official on his right has his black jacket open, and the color of the passageway floor, the wall and the fence are identical.
A rude gesture from Walz would have been noticed by at least one of the reporters who constantly tail him in the weeks before the 2024 presidential election. A keyword search conducted on October 1, 2024, turned up no credible reports that Walz used a finger gesture to "flip off" anyone at the Minnesota-Michigan game (archived here).
At the time this was written, Snopes had reviewed the same claim.
More Lead Stories fact checks about the 2024 U.S. presidential election can be found here. More Lead Stories fact checks about Tim Walz can be found here.
