Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) has spent so much of his time in the limelight as Kamala Harris’s running mate that the Democratic vice presidential nominee was hardly recognizable when he showed up to debate Republican running mate Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH). Walz was a shadow of the smiling, strutting, Cheshire Cat of a caricature that the public has gotten used to seeing. Instead, his gaze was vacant, his face growing redder, and his expression utterly perplexed.

And then he opened his mouth.