In vice presidential debate, Tim Walz says his son 'witnessed' the 2023 St. Paul shooting – Twin Cities

During a discussion about gun control at Tuesday night's vice presidential debate between Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Ohio Sen. JD Vance, Walz revealed that his son was on the verge of a shooting in St. Paul in 2023.

“I think every parent watching tonight, this is your worst nightmare,” Walz said. “A 17-year-old witnessed a shooting at a community center while playing volleyball. These things don’t let you go.”

Walz's son Gus, who was 16 at the time and attending St. Paul Central High School, was at the Jimmy Lee Recreation Center at the Oxford Community Center across from the school when a city employee shot a 16-year-old boy in the head in January 2023. The presidential campaign of Kamala Harris and Tim Walz confirmed the location of the shooting, which Walz described to multiple national news outlets during the debate late Tuesday night.

The teenager survived the shooting but suffered permanent brain injuries, according to a lawsuit his family filed against the city. The park employee who shot the teen, Exavir Dwayne Binford Jr., then 26, was initially charged with attempted murder and later pleaded guilty to first-degree assault. He was sentenced to ten years in prison earlier this year.

Shortly after Gus Walz made national headlines for his emotional reaction to his father's speech at the Democratic National Convention, a longtime St. Paul youth track and field coach who was at the recreation center with the governor's son during the shooting testified in a statement Social media post about what happened.

“He kept everyone safe and calm and took care of the kids in the gym with us while I rushed out,” said David Albornoz, who was among three who received an award from the St. Paul Fire Department the life-saving help for the teenager who was shot was received in the parking lot.

Albornoz said he coached Jimmy Lee's girls volleyball team with Gus Walz after Walz approached him about coaching Central High's boys volleyball team. The governor's son also helped organize open gyms to introduce younger children to the sport, Albornoz said.

“Too many of us have that.”

In a policy-centered debate between the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates that was marked by civility, Vance Walz expressed sympathy for what his son had experienced.

“Tim, first of all, I didn’t know your 17-year-old witnessed the shooting. And I'm sorry and I hope he's okay,” he said in gratitude from Walz. “Christ, have mercy. It’s terrible,” Vance continued.

Walz also referenced the shooting during a Sept. 12 campaign speech in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where he used it to criticize Vance, who had called school shootings a “fact of life” in America as he called for greater school safety, according to the Associated Press reported.

“Think about it. Now families are broken forever. Too many of us were there,” Walz told a crowd of supporters last month. “My own son was in a place where someone was shot in the head. Too many of us have that.”

Walz has shared the story with the media in the past, but this is the first time it has received widespread attention. Minnesota Public Radio said the governor told a reporter in the spring that his son was at the community center when the shooting happened.

The shooting

Court documents say Binford shot then-16-year-old JuVaughn Turner in the head after an argument between Binford, Turner and two other teenagers outside the community center, located on the east side of Lexington Parkway across from Central High School.

Binford tried to stop people from entering the community center after the building was placed on lockdown following reports of unrest at Central High School earlier in the day. He reportedly got into an argument with a girl who had let her brother into the building, according to court documents.

When Binford later met them as he was leaving work, two boys tried to intervene and got into an argument. But when the fight ended, Binford pulled out his pistol and shot Turner, according to court documents.

Binford had initially pleaded not guilty to attempted murder, arguing that he shot Turner in self-defense. He later agreed to plead guilty to a charge of second-degree assault in exchange for prosecutors dropping the more serious charge.

Turner's family has filed a lawsuit against the city of St. Paul for failing to fire Binford for a pattern of violence and threats toward minors while working for the Parks and Recreation Department.

Rolling record about weapons

When he was a Democratic congressman for a conservative-leaning district in the southern part of the state, the Minnesota governor once praised the National Rifle Association's “A” rating for his support of gun rights.

Since running for governor in 2018, Walz has tarnished that reputation by calling for stricter gun control measures, including a ban on “assault weapons,” a term that generally applies to semi-automatic firearms like the AR-15, the military-style rifles are modeled on.

As governor, Walz was able to enact gun control legislation with the help of Democratic, Farmers' and Labor majorities in the state House and Senate. They say the new laws will protect the public by preventing guns from falling into the wrong hands.

In 2023, they introduced universal background checks for gun sales and created the ability for courts to issue extreme risk protection orders, also known as the “red flag” law, which allows courts to order the confiscation of guns from people who pose a danger to yourself or others.

And this year, Walz also signed a bill to increase penalties for “straw purchases,” in which an authorized person purchases a firearm on behalf of an ineligible person. The bill came after the killing of two police officers and a firefighter in Burnsville by a man who obtained a gun through his girlfriend, a federal indictment says.

When asked by CBS News panel host Norah O'Donnell why he changed his stance on guns, Walz said he met with parents of the victims of the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Connecticut that left 26 people dead died, including 20 children aged 6 and 7.