Jonesboro, AR – (JonesboroRightNow.com) – August 8, 2024 – Kamala Harris’ choice for her Vice President running mate once worked in a Jonesboro tanning bed factory.
The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported today that Minnesota Governor Tim Walz moved to Arkansas after the death of his father in the 1980s. He was living in Nebraska.
While in Jonesboro Walz worked for a tanning bed factory.
The Democrat-Gazette report reported that in 2018 Walz, then a southern Minnesota congressman running for governor, told the Minneapolis Star Tribune that the 1984 death of his father had left him “ripped up.”
It wasn’t clear what led Walz to live and work in Arkansas.
The Democrat-Gazette reportedly reached out to the Jonesboro Regional Chamber of Commerce who told the newspaper that the tanning bed factory was one owned by the former Sun Industries, which was owned by Bill Hurt. Hurt founded the company in 1979
Democrat-Gazette reporter Aaron Gettinger spoke with Hurt by phone. Hurt, who is now retired, told Gettinger that he does not remember Walz but is happy to have apparently employed him, joking with the reporter that it “makes me look good.”
Hurt sold Sun Industries to JK Products and Services in 2004. JK closed the factory in 2013, which eliminated 82 jobs. The company continues to run a tanning bed distribution business in Jonesboro.