A Minnesota business owner who was forced to shut his doors after suffering financial devastation from the coronavirus pandemic and crime issued a scathing rebuke of Vice President Kamala Harris' running mate, Gov. Tim Walz, D-Minn., calling him an "evil person" for his handling of COVID-19.
"Walz is absolutely a total and complete failure," Greg Urban said Wednesday on "America Reports." "He's an incredibly divisive leader. He shut down the state for almost two years. Anybody that would go against his rules, so much as opening a coffee shop, would end up in jail for long periods of time."
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Urban, the owner of Wild Greg's Saloon, said he was forced to shutter his Minneapolis bar when it could not rebound after COVID-19 lockdowns eased.
Urban's locations in Austin, Texas; Pensacola, Fla.; and Lakeland, Fla., bounced back relatively quickly, but "there was no road map ahead" for Minneapolis, he told Fox News' John Roberts.
"Minneapolis was a failed city, and it really hasn’t gotten any better. We were losing money every single month, where every other city came back very quickly from COVID, and you can only lose money so many months in a row as a business owner before you have to pull the pin," he said.
In his first term as governor, Walz oversaw Minnesota's response to the COVID-19 pandemic and favored heavy-handed restrictions, including lockdowns and mask mandates. Walz's administration also set up a hotline to report residents who violated COVID-19 mandates, as FOX 9 Minneapolis reported at the time.
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"Walz was a complete dictator through that whole period. Really an evil person, more than a dictator," Urban said. "He actually made it illegal for families to gather for Christmas and Thanksgiving. And so people, then, if they saw their neighbor carrying out a turkey leg on Thanksgiving, they could call the tip line and Walz could dispatch his COVID police to come take them to jail."
Walz's handling of the pandemic came under scrutiny after Harris, the Democratic nominee, named him her running mate in the 2024 election. Critics are also pointing to Walz's response to the Minneapolis Black Lives Matter riots after the 2020 killing of George Floyd, calling it a failure and low point of his first term as governor.
Walz deployed the National Guard to stop the violence, which included the torching of a police station. But GOP lawmakers have said both the governor and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey were too slow to act.
"He stood by. He had every resource to end the riots very quickly, and he chose not to. He stood by. He let the burning, the looting, the protesting go for several days, and it was just a terrible thing for this city, and the city still hasn’t recovered."
Urban said patrons were afraid to come downtown, further laying into Walz for letting rioters and criminals run rampant.
"They were scared because of the crime. A lot of people were getting mugged," he said. "Their cars stolen, cars broken into, there were no police. You call the police, and unless there is a murder in progress, they might not even respond, or [it could] take an hour or two. It was a very troubling time, and Tim Walz refused to provide any state resources, state police, things other cities — such as maybe Austin, Texas, for example — had some help from the state. Here in Minnesota, Tim Walz provided no leadership to help Minneapolis."
He said he heard people compare Walz to Gov. Gavin Newsom, D-Calif., but he disagreed with the simplified characterization.
"I heard the comment yesterday that Walz is Newsom with less hair and wearing flannel. The reality is, Walz, I think, is more radical left than Gavin Newsom," Urban said. "In a state of 5 million people, I think it slides under the radar a little bit, but Tim Walz was an absolute dictator."
Urban also called out Walz for a comment he made at Tuesday's rally with Harris on the topic of personal freedoms.
"In Minnesota, we respect our neighbors and their personal choices that they make. Even if we wouldn't make the same choice for ourselves, there’s a golden rule: Mind your own damn business," Walz told the crowd.
Urban said Walz should have taken some of his own advice.
"The idea of ‘mind your own damn business’ sure did not happen with him," he said.
Walz's office did not respond to Fox News' request for comment.
Fox News Digital's Chris Pandolfo contributed to this report.
