Alright, fine, one more update before I go to bed. This is with 77.02% of precincts reporting:
| Candidate | Totals | Pct | Graph | |
| TOM BAKK | 1290 | 6.13 |  |
|
| MATT ENTENZA | 1444 | 6.86 | |
|
| SUSAN GAERTNER | 441 | 2.09 | |
|
| STEVE KELLEY | 878 | 4.17 | |
|
| MARGARET ANDERSON KELLIHER | 4216 | 20.03 | |
|
| JOHN MARTY | 2052 | 9.75 | |
|
| FELIX MONTEZ | 17 | 0.08 | |
|
| TOM RUKAVINA | 1517 | 7.21 | |
|
| R.T. RYBAK | 4589 | 21.80 | |
|
| OLE SAVIOR | 21 | 0.10 | |
|
| PAUL THISSEN | 1541 | 7.32 | |
|
| UNCOMMITTED | 3045 | 14.46 | |
Sure is interesting so far…
Pre-slumber preliminary thoughts: Straw polls aren’t worth much. After all, there’s a long way and a lot of steps between here and the convention (not to mention here and the general). Big things can happen—momentum can shift, scandals can surface, unions can endorse, and all that fun jazz. So, the most important thing to remember is to take anyone’s analysis (especially mine) with a huge grain of salt—no one knows how this will end up just because a straw poll of approximately 25,000 party activists was conducted. All that being said, there is one pretty glaring take away from the results tonight: Rybak and MAK are the main events. It’s surprising how big the drop off is to 3rd place and how crowded the bottom is. Does that mean the field will thin and the race for the endorsement will coalesce around those two? Almost certainly not. But it does mean that they get all the attention from being the two front runners—and I guarantee that not all of that will be good attention.
I get the feeling that the shivs are going to start coming out… please, please, please, prove me wrong.
Entenza is taking a beating …
Of the CUs reporting full results so far, the turnout seems low in the metro and downright sparse outstate. In Marshall county, 11 attendees will get to divvy up just 3 delegate and 3 alternate seats at the state convention. In Minneapolis’ SD62, 1042 attendees will fight over 28 delegate and 28 alternate seats… Quite a difference in turnout!
I thought Thissen was the dark horse, but I’m beginning to think it’s really Rukavina.
Looking at the results and noting the huge turnouts in south Minneapolis, it looks like they’re an artifact of disproportionate turnout rather than any candidates popularity.
Rukavina!
Hahahahahaha! Dyna, you are hilarious! Yes, the large number of votes for MAK and RT don’t represent candidate popularity. It’s all an unfair fluke, a biased system that favors those who show up to vote!
And we’ve had what- maybe 20,000 hard core DFLers vote tonight. The baseline DFL vote is 50 times that!
Marty looks to me to be the surprise of the night. He is currently at nearly 10% with over 70% reporting, which puts him inn 3rd place. At my little caucus with 15 attendees, Marty received over 25% of the vote. Not sure who voted for him or why, but I suspect it is his advocacy for single payer health care. Other top voter getters in my precinct matched the statewide results with MAK and Rybek tied with 20% each.
I also “suspect it is his advocacy for single payer health care” that placed John Marty over better-organized and bigger-spending candidates. More than that, I “suspect” the votes for Marty are votes that recognize that he’s one person who CAN be trusted not to sell out and not to back down on matters of principle!
Are the other candidates listening? And are they listening to Tom Bakk patiently reiterating “jobs, jobs, jobs”? Now, the “front-runners” are not so far in front as to be anointed!
our little county of fillmore in southeastern minnesota went for marty, rt & margeret… in that order…
SMD: Marty is in 4th place. Uncommitted (Dayton) is in 3rd.
why do you think all uncommitted are for dayton? i think they are all for marty… they just don’t know him yet
Thissen or Rukavina may win this endorsement; here’s why.
Some of the uncommitted folks wil be Dayton supporters. It’s unlikely any of the uncommitteds will break for RT or MAK — they are known quantities — if someone was going to be persuaded by their campaigns it would have happened by now. So there’s that chunk of votes, plus the blocks of Kelley and Bakk, and throw in the Gaertner and Entenza supporters for purposes of convention “free agents.” Again, I don’t see the Kelley and Bakk supporters going to RT or MAK; Susan’s folks may be inclined to MAK, but Matt’s folks certainly are not going to support MAK or RT. Bottom line: there are lots of delegates up for grabs, meaning that Paul Thissen and Tom Rukavina are still very much in this race for the endorsement.
why leave john marty out of the equation?
Random thoughts:
At this point last year, I was leaning towards Kelliher, but the aftermath of the legislative session and poor polling numbers on her part moved me into the undecided column. Rukavina has been my favorite for a few months now, although I didn’t think he had much of a chance outside his district, so I haven’t really commented on the race much. Haven’t decided who my second favorite is.
This also vindicates the predictions I’d been making for a year that Steve Kelley was wasting his time.
It appears that my prediction in comments yesterday was a bit too favorable to Rybak, who, while coming in first like I predicted, didn’t pull it off by the margin I had thought he would.
Random thoughts cont:
DFL turnout (with 77% of precincts reporting): 21,444
GOP turnout (with 93% of precincts reporting): 18,386
So much for the predictions of an energized GOP base outnumbering a depressed DFL base. The numbers do seem fairly consistent with turnout in past midterm elections, maybe even a little below average in both parties.
On the GOP side, Seifert leads Emmer 50%-39%. For those with long memories, Brian Sullivan beat Pawlenty 51%-37% in the caucus straw poll eight years ago, but Pawlenty went on to win the endorsement.
Biggest frustration of the night: why isn’t the SoS website posting the caucus results by county and/or legislative district like they did in ‘08?
Biggest question of the night: Does anyone know what the drop rules are going to be at this year’s convention? Or have they decided yet?
“DFL turnout (with 77% of precincts reporting): 21,444
GOP turnout (with 93% of precincts reporting): 18,386
So much for the predictions of an energized GOP base outnumbering a depressed DFL base.”
You liberals and your stinking facts.
why isn’t the SoS website posting the caucus results by county and/or legislative district like they did in ‘08?
Pawlenty slashed their budget.
One has to look where the votes are coming from:
Minneapolis has about 10% percent of the state convention delegates, but has produced about 20% of the votes. That’s RT’s turf, so clearly his “lead” is an artifact of high turnout in his city. MAK had incredible turnout in her home district, and given her outstate roots she’s probably ahead of RT in the delegate count. Thissen had huge turnout in his district, but is still below 10%- that’s bad news. Turnout in Marty’s district was so-so, so at almost 10% he may still be in the running. Kelley had so-so turnout on his hometurf too, but at under 5% he’s out of the running, while Geartner looks for a do-over in the primary. Bakk, Entenza, and Rukavina are all around 6 to 7%, but they each have strong outstate roots that will produce twice as many delegates as the poll numbers suggest. So translating the poll results into delegate counts MAK probably has a slight early lead, followed closely by Bakk, Entenza, Marty, Rukavina, and RT.
Another Chris (and others who want to see posts by county and legislative district) try:
http://caucusresults.sos.state.mn.us/
Have fun.
For someone who once led the House DFL, has run for statewide office before and has spent a small fortune already promoting himself, Matt Entenza appears to be the Big Loser last night. Even his own party dislikes him. The guy barely beat Bakk, a virtual unknown outside of the Arrowhead, and trailed Rukavina for chrissakes. Clearly party activists attending caucuses know enough about Entenza not to like him. Can you imagine how that would translate if he were facing voters from the opposition party too?