In case you hadn’t already heard, Raymond Thomas Rybak will be running for a third term as Mayor of Minneapolis. As the ever-improving Star Tribune notes in their sub-headline: “Rybak says he’s energizes for a third term.” This isn’t a huge surprise given RT’s new year’s eve mayoral fundraiser, but it does firmly close the door for some City Council members who have been licking their chops at rumors of a Rybak Obama appointment or a 2010 gubernatorial run. And now that he has announced, we can announce the winner of the 2009 Minneapolis Mayoral race: RT Rybak. Okay, so maybe there’s some slim possibility that he won’t succeed in his bid for a third term, but I don’t see him losing absent some new information from Ashley Dupré on her clientele… (for those of you without a sense of humor, that’s a joke)
So what about that 2010 gubernatorial race?
Well, some in the blogosphere jumped to the reasonable conclusion that this announcement forecloses any possibility of a Rybak run in 2010 but the Mayor notably declined to make any such statements. No doubt, two races in two years puts a lot of strains in a lot of places (most notably, donors), but it’s not impossible by any means.
I may have been singing a different tune just a few weeks ago, but with Congressman Tim Walz out of the picture, the 2010 DFL race is suddenly much more attainable for all other interested parties. Walz was truly the 800 pound gorilla in the room and his exit leaves much more room for other candidates to fill the void. Then factor in the inevitably abysmal session the legislature is facing (to no fault of their own) with the budget in the current shape it is and the potency of the whole slew of legislative candidates is necessarily diminished, even Kelliher’s (of course she could come out of this swinging, I’m just noting the current state of things). And while he’s built up a great political staff, Mayor Coleman has also announced his plans for another run in St. Paul.
So, who do we have left for 2010 who isn’t tainted by the state budget crisis, stated disinterest, or running for a mayoral reelection? Susan Gaertner, Mark Dayton, and Matt Entenza (who else am I missing). I haven’t heard all that much from the first two (almost nothing at all from Dayton) but Entenza is rumored to be serious about running and throwing his weight (and money) around to intimidate others away.
The point of all the above (other than taking an advantage to postulate about 2010, which is always fun) is that there is a very real possibility that the DFL won’t have a clear front-runner come November. Now, of course, we could, but that would be atypical of DFL gubernatorial endorsement battles and fairly surprising given the density of the field. If the field is still a tangled mess, Rybak wouldn’t have an exceedingly tough time entering: the mayoral race will likely be a walk in the park so he could start hitting up delegates behind the scenes early, he has a loyal donor base that he shouldn’t have to hit too hard for the mayoral race, he’s one of the few candidates with good name recognition (yes, even in outstate MN), and he’s fairly popular. These are reasons he could still run, however; a combination of personal fatigue, donor fatigue, a heated field, and another run by Tim Pawlenty would lead me to bet against a 2010 by Rybak, but who knows.
Bottom line: the Rybak didn’t close the door today, but the opening got much narrower. Now what are we DFLers going to do about a candidate…?
I couldn’t agree more with Congressman Ellison’s statements today. These are dire times, Congress is about to spend billions (if not trillions) of dollars, Minnesota’s budget is deep in red, and we’re going to go into it all with only one Senator. We have certified election results and if Coleman’s legal challenge succeeds Franken can be recalled, but isn’t this the time to watch out for Minnesota’s interests instead of political interests? Here is what Congressman Ellison has to say (emphasis mine):
With Ritchie and Pawlenty 
People Are Shouting
RSS