The 2024 vice presidential debate was held Tuesday night on CBS and it did not go perfectly well for the Democratic participant, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.

While discussing mass shootings and gun control, Walz sparked controversy when he surprisingly claimed that he's "become friends with school shooters," according to the Daily Mail.

That was, of course, a misstatement on his part that he later corrected, but the damage from his verbal flub had already been done.

Walz said what?!?

The topic of gun violence and school safety came up during the debate and Gov. Walz shared a story about how his son Gus, 17, had "witnessed a shooting at a community center playing volleyball," and how traumatic incidents like that "don't leave you" -- a tragic story that elicited genuine sympathy from his GOP opponent, Sen. JD Vance (R-OH).

Just a moment later, however, while still on the same topic, Walz uttered his miscue on befriending school shooters and said, "I met in that office with Sandy Hook parents. I've become friends with school shooters, I've seen it."

Referencing cultural and societal changes about firearms over the years, the governor added, "Look, the NRA, I was an NRA guy for a long time. They used to teach gun safety. I am of an age where my shotgun was in my car so I could pheasant hunt after football practice."

Trump, others rip Walz over apparent misstatement

The Daily Mail reported that it was initially unclear whether Gov. Walz misspoke about school shooters or exactly what he intended to say, but some school shooting survivors and the parents of school shooting victims were quick to criticize the Democratic candidate for what he said.

One example was Andrew Pollack, whose daughter was killed in the Parkland, Florida shooting several years ago, who wrote on social media, "My daughter was killed in the Parkland school shooting. It's absolutely abhorrent that Tim Walz has befriended school shooters. Disqualifying

So too did former President Donald Trump weigh in, and posted to Truth Social, "Did Tampon Tim just say he has 'become friends with school shooters?' He isn’t even qualified to be Governor, let alone Vice President. Walz and Kamala DO NOT HAVE WHAT IT TAKES!"

"Walz made a very big mistake on Gun Shooters. Does anyone think he knows what he said? Will he have a News Conference after the Debate to apologize to the parents and others who were so horribly hurt?" he added in a follow-up post, and in another shared a meme of a Trump-Vance '24 sign that read "Not friends with school shooters."

Walz issues a clarification

As could be expected, Gov. Walz later clarified his remarks on Wednesday, according to The Hill, and said in a statement that he meant befriending people who've been impacted by school shooters, not the shooters themselves.

As for the rest of the discussion during the debate, Walz made it clear that his solution to address school shootings is to violate the Second Amendment and the rights of lawful gun owners with more and stricter gun control laws.

The Daily Mail noted that both Walz and Sen. Vance agreed that school shootings are an important issue that must be addressed and reduced, but differ wildly on how to go about doing so.

While Walz talked about gun control, Vance said, "We have to make the doors lock better. We have to make the doors stronger. We've got to make the windows stronger, and of course, we've got to increase school resource officers, because the idea that we can magically wave a wand and take guns out of the hands of bad guys, it just doesn't fit with recent experience. So we've got to make our schools safer."