In rural Pennsylvania, Tim Walz gets a good reception — from most people

Tim Walz was in full coach mode as he loomed over a hungry calf, a bottle of milk in hand.

“You got it, you got it! You’re close, sweetie. There you go,” he said, heaping encouragement onto the young cow at Maple Bottom Farm in Dawson, Pennsylvania.

The governor of Minnesota and vice presidential candidate had been dispatched on his first solo tour of the state — a “barnstorming,” in the words of his campaign — to win over voters in rural areas that have been stubbornly pro-Trump since 2016.

His pitch to rural Pennsylvanians, as told in every photo-op and stop and along the way, was simple: “I am just like you.”

There are few paths to victory for Kamala Harris and Walz without winning Pennsylvania, and few paths to winning Pennsylvania without earning at least some votes out here in the rolling farmlands that stretch across the state.

Joe Biden was able to narrowly win in this area by appealing to white working-class voters with the story of his difficult upbringing in Scranton.

Harris doesn’t have that story, but in Tim Walz she has a running mate who likely feels very familiar to those same voters.

Ask Walz supporters out here how he can win voters in rural Pennsylvania, and you’ll receive a variety of answers.

“He’s a strong union guy — that will count for a lot,” said Bill Waters, a former city controller of Lancaster and a union man for most of this life.

“He cares about the farmers in Minnesota. There’s a lot of farmers around here,” said Doug Wickenheiser, a Democrat outside Walz’s stop in Lancaster.

“I used to live in the northern part of the state and football’s big up there. Being a coach, a lot of guys can relate to that,” said Nancy Shot, a resident who stopped to wave to Walz as he arrived at an event.

“He