Walz is speaking out publicly for the first time on the deportation of a pardoned Minnesotan

On Tuesday, Walz questioned the federal government’s decision to deport Tou Lue Vang despite a state pardon for a decades-old sexual assault conviction. Vang was convicted of abusing a 10-year-old child between 2002 and 2004.

Walz emphasized that the unanimous pardon followed an exhaustive board review.

"When somebody commits a crime, they're convicted, they do their time and they continue to live their lives for decades afterwards," Walz said. "They have the option of coming in front of the pardon commission and then the pardon board. Just remember, both were minors."

He says the victim in the case personally advocated on for Vang’s pardon, and Walz is now questioning if Vang's sudden deportation truly improved public safety.

"Did that make us any safer? Did that make the children that are left behind any more stable? Did it improve the idea that we can't all be judged by our worst day? And I want to be very clear, these are horrific crimes," Walz noted.

Vang, who was 18 when he was convicted, avoided prison through a plea deal, but spent nearly two decades living in the U.S. facing deportation.

Vang was arrested during the Department of Homeland Security's “Operation Metro Surge” in December. His removal was imminent when the state’s three-member Board of Pardons, Walz (D), Attorney General Keith Ellison (D), and Supreme Court Chief Justice Natalie Hudson, unanimously granted that pardon on June 10.

He was deported to Laos on July 10.

"Because of our action, this foreign criminal will never pose a threat to any American ever again," U.S. Sec. of State Marco Rubio said in a social media post. "Americans must never be forced by their elected leaders to live alongside foreign sex criminals who have no right to begin with to reside in our country."

Vang's pardon sparked political attacks from local and national Republican party leaders that Democrats are soft on crime and immigration enforcement. Minnesota Republican House Speaker, and gubernatorial candidate, Lisa Demuth also chimed in on social media saying Sec. Rubio was 'correct to act.'

"Deport child predators. Do not pardon child predators," she said. "Not sure why that’s a hard concept for Tim Walz and Amy Klobuchar to understand."

U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar, who has been endorsed by the Minnesota DFL in the governor's race responded to Demuth's statement: "As a former prosecutor I have not supported pardons for sex offenders and would not have voted for this pardon."