Gwen Walz and Tim Walz are known as a team. But Minnesota’s first lady has been a powerful force in her own right

Chicago CNN —

“I’ll make it happen.”

It’s an expression Gwen Walz is known to use no matter what role she’s playing – a mom protecting her kids, an educator trying to increase graduation rates, or a colleague delivering food to a friend whose spouse has cancer.

“That’s what she will say all the time, is, ‘I’ll make it happen,’” said Paula O’Loughlin, a provost at Augsburg University, where the first lady of Minnesota has been actively involved since her husband was elected, even teaching a master’s course this spring.

Gwen Walz’s biggest test on the national stage will begin Wednesday night, when she is introduced to America at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago – just two weeks after Kamala Harris selected her husband, Gov. Tim Walz, to be her running mate.

Since the Walzs made their national political debut in Philadelphia earlier this month, their background as former high school teachers who met in the classroom has become a key narrative about the Midwestern sensibility Democrats think they bring to the ticket.

But in conversations with former students, colleagues and friends of Gwen Walz, what’s emerged is not just a portrait of a cardigan-wearing American literature teacher; she’s a political spouse who’s also been a political partner, driven by her own passions and ability to connect with people and think strategically in ways that complement her husband.

“The country is sort of getting a twofer,” said John Klaber, who first met the couple in 1996 as new teachers at Mankato West High School, where he was serving as a school psychologist.

“They’re both passionate, skilled, you know, bright people. And neither one is a shrinking violet.”