To try to appeal to young male voters, Vice Presidential candidate Tim Walz played Madden with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, streaming it on Twitch, a live streaming service. He also played Crazy Taxi, all while talking about the upcoming election.
Walz had an upcoming rally to attend in Nevada, but took time to play Madden while interacting with a live audience.
Ocasio-Cortez had wanted to do a livestream campaign event, as her fans had asked her to do so, and Walz reached out and was interested in doing it with her. Since he was a football coach, Ocasio-Cortez had asked him whether he played Madden. Walz had played Madden with his kids, and was excited to play it, despite not having played in a while.
The stream’s goal wasn’t only to play games, and Ocasio-Cortez made this clear early on, discussing the upcoming election. “The need to defeat Trump this year has been my number one priority,” Ocasio-Cortez said.
After playing Stardew Valley, Ocasio-Cortez brought Walz on. They immediately began criticizing Trump about his lack of care for social security. “When I hear [Republicans] call it a Ponzi scheme, I guess Donald Trump doesn’t care if he gets a social security check, my 90 year-old mom does, she needs it.”
They both bonded over the losses of their fathers, further emphasizing the importance of social security. “A lot of people don’t know that Social Security also helps you if you lose a spouse (or parent, if you’re a kid). It’s so important we defend and expand it,” Ocasio-Cortez tweeted after the livestream.
They both expressed their mutual interest in abolishing the filibuster. “We gotta get rid of that thing,” Ocasio-Cortez said.
They then started playing Madden, with Walz playing the Vikings (This was unsurprising, since he had joined the livestream with a camouflage Vikings hat, and is from Minnesota), and Ocasio-Cortez playing the Bills.
During the game, Ocasio-Cortez brought up the topic of the housing crisis, and claimed that the solution would be to increase the amount of housing as well as diversify the types of housing. “We need to increase the housing supply, and the kinds of housing,” Ocasio-Cortez said.
Walz also poked at J.D. Vance’s comment about the cause of the crisis during their earlier debate. Vance had explained that the problem was rooted in migrants buying houses that could have gone to other buyers. Walz said that “that’s crap,” and re-emphasized that speculators were decreasing the supply by purchasing them, and increasing the price. It is important to “[Stop] these speculators from buying up homes and driving up the prices,” Walz said.
They only played one half, and ended with a 0-0 tie. Walz also later played Crazy Taxi near the end of the stream.
It remains to be seen how much this will affect this target demographic of young male voters, if at all. But, for some, it is simply fun to see someone in this position do something to reach out in this way. “It’s cool that he’s doing something for the young voters,” South Lakes High School Sophomore Quinn Connell said. After watching Walz play for a bit, Connell commented that Walz was playing it competently, with knowledge of the game, not just as an attempt to gain popularity. “He definitely knows what he’s doing,” Connell said.
Connell thinks that his job as a football coach will be helpful for the election, along with doing activities like live streaming video games. “I think his background in football as a head coach and doing stuff like this is really gonna attract the younger voters,” Connell said.
