Archive for the 'MN 2010: Governor' Category

Page 2 of 5

Entenza Raises Over $300K in 2009

by Matt Martin | 19 Comments

I just received a press release from Entenza campaign manager Bridget Cusick:

Matt Entenza’s campaign for governor announced today that it raised more than $300,000 in the 2009 reporting period.

Only two gubernatorial candidates have cleared this threshold in the off-year under the current campaign finance laws: Ted Mondale in 1998 and Mike Hatch in 2006.

The Entenza campaign also notes that this came from more than 1700 donors with no PAC money and “just over 1% in lobbyist contributions.”

These are impressive numbers but it’s difficult to assess just how impressive before seeing the sort of numbers the other candidates put up.  I would expect, however, that Entenza’s 2009 numbers will be field-leading because he’s been the most prominent fundraiser of the early-announcers. Entenza announced in January while Kelliher announced in September and Rybak just last month.  Meanwhile, Dayton hasn’t appeared to be pushing very hard on the fundraising front and I wouldn’t expect either Gaertner or Kelley to match Entenza here.  Thissen’s a bit of a wild-card, but Entenza’s $300K is going to be tough to beat in this busy field.

I think the much more interesting (and relevant) number will be Q4 2009, with the first real comparison of all the major candidates not coming until Q1 2010. That all being said, don’t put too much stock in the money game just yet — it’s very important that these guys show an ability to connect with voters’ and their wallets, and Entenza certainly deserves a feather in his cap for demonstrating as much, but it’s a bit early in an off-cycle state race for anyone to post any game-changer numbers.

The only other candidate I’ve seen that has numbers posted is Rep. Tom Rukavina with $125K in 5 months, which is truly impressive in its own right.  But we’ll have to wait a while to really be able to compare these candidates’ fundraising numbers in any meaningful way.

January 6, 2010, 2:20 pm | Category: MN 2010: Governor | Tags: , .

A Fever Dream I Had Last Night

by Sean Broom | 1 Comment

I wasn’t sure how I got there and the details were a bit of a blur, but I was sitting in a gray meeting room with carpeted walls.  I was trying to be innocuous, and it seemed as though no one noticed me.  In the room sat three men.  There was a balding bulldog of a man wearing modernist glasses,  a round guy with the slightly disheveled appearance of someone who spends a lot of time around fast food, and skittering weaselly man with a grating accent and just a twinkle of letch in his eye.

More »

January 6, 2010, 9:54 am | Category: MN 2010: Governor |

Who cares about this whole “endorsement” thing anyway?

by Matt Martin | 31 Comments

The news of the hour is that Ramsey County Attorney Susan Gaertner has announced that she will not abide by the DFL endorsement and will run in the party primary. The money-quote from her press release: “To be honest, I think my original plan to rely solely on the endorsement and convention process was too politically limiting.” Read: I don’t think I’m going to get endorsed.

With her announcement, the list of candidates not abiding by the endorsement jumps to four: Gaertner, Mark Dayton, Matt Entenza, and Steve Kelley. (edit: Apparently Steve Kelley hasn’t made a final decision on the endorsement, just saw this tweet from Tom Scheck: “A spokesman for Steve Kelley said Kelley is considering the DFL endorsement very carefully but has not ruled out a primary run.”)  Without delving into the relative merits and faults of the endorsement process (personally, I’m neither a loyalist nor a hater), this begs the question: does the DFL endorsement matter?

In a word, yes. While it’s painfully obvious that the endorsement will not be the party unifying, field-clearing event that some may wish it to be, that doesn’t sap it of importance for the candidate that does get endorsed. Increasingly, it’s appearing that the endorsement race is between Bakk, Keliher, and Rybak — not to discount the other candidates, especially Thissen who has an outside shot as a consensus candidate, but this is currently the political reality — and it’s difficult (although not impossible) to envision a path to the governor’s mansion for any one of those three candidates that doesn’t include a DFL endorsement.

The endorsement lends the candidate an added air of legitimacy and a great deal of momentum that will be crucial in the pivot towards the primary. Without either Dayton or Entenza’s ability to self-finance (and Dayton’s massive head-start in name recognition), the endorsement becomes a crucial weapon in a primary battle. Sure, the endorsed candidate still has to contend with a primary battle, but I would assert that he or she will be in the best position of any DFL primary contender, at least at the outset of the primary race. (The ability to self-finance a gubernatorial race simply isn’t the all-destroying ace-up-the-sleeve some imagine it to be)

Now, let me make something else clear: I actually don’t hold anything against Dayton, Entenza, Gaertner, or Kelley for not abiding. It’s a very crowded field and, without getting into who cast the first stone, that makes the calculus complicated. That being said, I find it hard to see how Kelley or Gaertner win the primary without the party’s endorsement. I’ve been a huge Steve Kelley fan for some time and Gaertner has consistently been one of the most impressive candidates on the stump, but neither one has sufficient momentum or resources to go it without the endorsement boost. But, hey, I would be pleasantly surprised if either one of them pulled-off the underdog triumph.

Bottom Line: At the end of April (the convention is April 23-35) we’ll most likely have a three-way race in the DFL gubernatorial primary — Mark Dayton, Matt Entenza, and the DFL endorsed candidate — with the DFL endorsed candidate the presumptive front-runner. Various other permutations are definitely possible (say, Keliher snagging the endorsement and Rybak deciding to run in the primary), but I’m comfortable pegging this as the most likely.

All political maneuverings aside, no matter what happens between here and there, I’m feeling pretty dang good about where this race will be in September.

January 5, 2010, 2:19 pm | Category: MN 2010: Governor | Tags: .

Doug Grow Analyzes Governor Field

by Matt Martin | 15 Comments

Doug Grow over at MinnPost does an admirable job of breaking down where the race and it’s 17 candidates stand at this point. It’s definitely worth the read.

Personally, I wouldn’t add much to Grow’s analysis. I’m a bit more skeptical of a Coleman entrance into the race than Grow seems to be — every day that passes makes this more difficult for him and I’ve heard from more than one Republican that he would only be their candidate again over a lot of party loyalist bodies. That being said, he’s still a potential force and while he’d have (I think) insurmountable problems in getting the endorsement, Coleman would be likely to win the GOP primary.

On the DFL side, it’s very nice of him to look at all of the candidates, but there’s some obvious weeding that can be done at this point. This is not a statement about the relative merits of the various candidates, but simply a political reality. But, hey, the endorsement process has yielded its fair share of surprises…

Anyone out there have any predictions?

January 4, 2010, 10:02 am | Category: MN 2010: Governor | Tags: .

Coleman polling in MN-GOV race?

by Jeff Rosenberg | 22 Comments

Oh please oh please oh please oh please….

A reader at MN Progressive Project reports getting a poll that sounds like it was from the Coleman camp. Is Coleman planning to jump into the race? The DFL can only hope.

Coleman has a lot of residual goodwill from conservatives who supported him during the recount. Given his lack of conservative principles — or really any principles whatsoever — he wouldn’t ordinarily have an easy time during a GOP primary, but he just might be able to get the nod, which would be a tremendous gift to the DFL.

The fact is, Coleman is not popular with Minnesotans, and he’s had a heck of a time winning statewide elections. In fact, his only success — a narrow victory over Walter Mondale, running in Paul Wellstone’s stead — came in such extraordinary circumstances that it can hardly be considered an example of Coleman’s ability to win at the statewide level. More recently,he failed to get 42 percent of the vote against Al Franken, which does not indicate a high probability of success in future elections, to say the least.

We all know how much trouble the DFL has had in recent gubernatorial elections. Now, though, they may have a new secret weapon — Norm Coleman.

December 22, 2009, 6:19 pm | Category: MN 2010: Governor and Misc. Local Politics | Tags: .

Norm Coleman Would Be A Game Changer

by Zack Stephenson | 29 Comments

Multiple outlets are reporting today that former Sen. Norm Coleman is a possible gubernatorial candidate. Norm announced over the summer that he if he were to run, he wouldn’t jump into the race until early in 2010. At the time, most observers interpreted that statement as a sign that Norm wouldn’t run at all, as an early 2010 campaign start date would make it nearly impossible to win a MN GOP endorsement at a convention in April. Now it looks like we may have been wrong and Norm may actually run after all.

So what are the implications of a potential Coleman candidacy? Its all good for the DFL.   Find out why after the jump.

More »

December 3, 2009, 2:11 pm | Category: MN 2010: Governor |

Charlie Weaver Won’t Run For Governor

by Zack Stephenson | 1 Comment

From the Pioneer Press:

A Republican with deep ties to the Minnesota business community has decided against a run for governor next year.

Minnesota Business Partnership Executive Director Charlie Weaver said today he won’t get into the wide-open race. Weaver had been mulling a campaign since incumbent GOP Gov. Tim Pawlenty ruled out a third-term bid.

Weaver is a former state legislator, state agency commissioner and chief of staff to Pawlenty.

I don’t know if he could have gotten the GOP nomination, but Weaver would have been a very strong general election candidate for the Republicans. He’s a moderate and has a strong base in Anoka County, a key battleground in statewide elections. You can add Weaver to the list of potentially strong Republican candidates (Pawlenty, Coleman, Sviggum, Sullivan, etc…) who have passed on this race. Every day it looks more and more likely that Marty Siefert will be the Republican nominee, and that makes every day a good day for Democrats.

UPDATE: For those who think I’m crazy when I say Weaver would have been a strong candidate, check out this “top ten reasons I won’t be running for Governor” that he released today…

1. The Governor’s Residence is nice, but it ain’t Anoka;
2. Old streaking ” incident” makes endorsement unlikely;
3. Has only raised $25.13 so far;
4. Discovered that he has to pay for personal parties at the Residence;
5. Thinks unallotment is a board game;
6. Troopers told him he couldn’t wander the Residence in his underwear;
7. Friends are too “busy” to attend convention;
8. Gift ban makes it harder to get free stuff;
9. Not interested in all those boring budget meetings; and
10. Recent polling reveals he would lose to the intoxicated motorized LazyBoy guy.

November 23, 2009, 9:26 am | Category: MN 2010: Governor |

Rybak files paperwork to run for Governor

by Jeff Rosenberg | 7 Comments

Holy Moley, that was fast. RT Rybak send out an announcement last night:

…I want you to know that today we filed the paperwork to create the R.T. Rybak for Governor Committee.

Obviously, this isn’t a surprise. Everybody knew it was coming, and I think Rybak will make a strong candidate. All the same, my very first reaction was that he ought to have at least waited for the ink to dry on the ballots that re-elected him as mayor.

UPDATE: The timing probably has something to do with this.

Rybak’s full announcement is below the break:

More »

November 6, 2009, 4:00 pm | Category: MN 2010: Governor |

Republicans gleefully look for ways to break the State that Works

by Jeff Rosenberg | 4 Comments

Or maybe that should be “State that Worked,” after Tim Pawlenty has had his way with us. If you think Pawlenty made a mess of things — and if you don’t, just wait until his accounting gimmicks start to fade — just imagine what will happen if we let some of the Republican gubernatorial candidates get ahold of the reins of power. It’s shocking to me just how giddy they are at the prospect of making sure your state no longer works for you.

Rachel Stassen-Berger has the story, albeit dressed up in nicer terms, at the Star Tribune:

The candidates are ambitious in their pledges to shrink government — “The sky’s the limit,” state Rep. Tom Emmer said at a recent forum

That’s encouraging: The sky’s the limit in making our government broken. But the big question, likely the one the Republican endorsement will hinge upon, is just how to break the government. Merge departments! says Emmer. No, break them up! says Pat Anderson. Slash human services funding! says Marty Seifert. No, slash education funding! says Anderson. No, slash absolutely everything! says Paul Kohls.

One of my favorite lines: “Seifert said he’d reduce ‘abuse’ of emergency rooms,” despite the fact that the Republicans are all against health reform, which would help all Minnesotans gain access to primary care. I suppose the Republicans want to eliminate the “loophole” that allows even the poorest Minnesotans to receive catastrophic health care.

I guess the problem I’m having here is that I’ve never understood the conservative trope that our government is the enemy. Our government, after all, is us — a government by the people and for the people, to which we all contribute and from which we all receive. Yes, it’s true that the neediest receive the most and contribute the least, but is someone out there really going to tell me it should be the other way around?

October 26, 2009, 1:00 pm | Category: MN 2010: Governor | Tags: , , .

Marty Seifert on Renewable Energy

by Aaron Landry | 11 Comments

There’s an amazing group of Republicans running for governor in 2010, most of whom are so far outside of mainstream logic that we can continue to expect a lot of humor between now and the election. Here’s a little nugget on Marty Seifert:

Marty Seifert opened two hours of discussion with our Prager group with a short dissertation on his passion for our country. He continued to speak and respond to our questions without once referring to a note—a refreshing change from our dear leader and his ever-present teleprompter.

Great! Passion! That’ll help! Here’s my favorite part:

5. How to convince young adults. Several college students came to Seifert’s office with a plea for renewable energy. After an object lesson where he asked the students to give up their cell phones, computers, and other fun items, the kids saw the light!

Heh. Seifert’s version of “renewable energy”: give up using energy, experience enlightenment. Amazing.

October 12, 2009, 1:52 pm | Category: MN 2010: Governor | Tags: .

“Kelliher: Governor’s Office or Bust”

by Matt Martin | 16 Comments

Interesting news via Rachel Stassen-Berger:

House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher, a Minneapolis Democrat running for governor, won’t be coming back to the Minnesota House for the 2011 session. She will not run for re-election to the House should she not win the endorsement for governor, she said Monday.

She said she decided it was important for voters to know what job she wants and she wants “to be the governor of Minnesota.” [Strib’s Hot Dish Politics Blog, 10/12/2009]

October 12, 2009, 1:48 pm | Category: MN 2010: Governor |

The AFSCME Debate

by Zack Stephenson | 44 Comments

AFSCME hosted a debate among the DFL candidates for Governor up in Duluth the other day, and MPR was kind enough to post the audio.  Overall, the debate was very civil, and most of the candidates did not engage each other.  The one exception to this was R.T. Rybak, who took a shot at the all of the current and former legislators in the field, saying “This is not a legislative job, its a chief executive.”  Rybak also slammed Dayton (and possibly Entenza) for their positions on the DFL endorsement.

Below are my impressions for each candidate:

Steve Kelley: Kelley didn’t show me anything new in this debate.  That’s not a criticism, just an observation.  He’s the same candidate he was in 2006.  He did have a couple of odd moments.  He  took a question about the state budget deficit and ended up talking about the public option in the national health care bill.   Later on he stumbled a bit when asked how he would deal with Pawlenty’s disastrous record with the Department of Human Serives.  Kelley said he has not decided on whether to abide by the DFL endorsement.

R.T. Rybak: Came right out of the gate strong and was the feistiest candidate by far.  I already mentioned his hit on the legislators, but he also took a direct shot at Dayton at the end of the debate when all of the candidates were asked whether they would abide by the DFL endorsement.  Dayton had called the endorsement process undemocratic and said he would not abide on principle.  Rybak responded, “I will absolutely abide. No games, no equivocation.  I don’t get this baloney that a party endorsement process isn’t a democratic process.  I don’t get that.”

Mark Dayton:  This was Dayton at his best, passionate and articulate.  He had a great line when asked about jobs, “Pawlenty believes the solution to the jobs problem is to furlough [AFSCME members] from their jobs and then not show up for his own.”  Zing.  As previously noted, Dayton will not abide.

Matt Entenza: He opened up the debate by noting that he is from Worthington, which is so far south that he “doesn’t like Iowa jokes.”  I’m not sure I can support a candidate who doesn’t like Iowa jokes.  On a more serious note, Entenza did a great job of using his compelling personal story to his advantage.  It was a strong performance from Entenza.  When asked about the DFL endorsement, Entenza gave his standard answer, which is that he will abide if everyone else abides.  Of course, he said this just minutes after Dayton said he would not honor the endorsement and would run in the primary.  Pretty obnoxious.  Closed circuit to Matt, just say you are not going to abide.  You are not scoring any points by playing this little game.

Tom Rukavina:  Was entertaining as always.  Described himself as “the love child between Paul Wellstone and Jesse Ventura” and then bragged about his union made underwear.  He had a great moment later when talking about Norman Borlag.  Said Borlag only graduated from the U because of financial aid.  Asked, “how many Norman Borlags are we cheating?”  Said he would abide by the DFL endorsement.

John Marty:  What struck me most about Marty was that he is clearly stuck in the past.  He took every question and used his time to talk about budget votes in the 90s and was also the only candidate to bring up the Time “the state that works” magazine cover.  Get into this decade Marty.  Will abide (and said if he didn’t get the endorsement he’d return to the Senate).

Paul Thissen:  If you are wondering why everyone has been talking about Paul Thissen, you should listen to this debate.  Thissen sounded sharp, engaging and fresh.  Had a nice moment talking about his kid’s struggles with the health care system.  Will abide.

Susan Gaertner: Did a nice job using stories from her time as County Attorney and her personal life.  My favorite line of hers was, “I’ve raised three teenage girls, you think I’m going to have a hard time making the hard decisions?  I’m not.”  Will abide.

Tom Bakk: Spent the whole debate touting his union credentials.  Maybe not a bad strategy given this was a union audience.  Otherwise, he was pretty forgettable.  Said, “my plans are to abide by the DFL endorsement.”  Does that leave the door open just a bit? UPDATE: Sen. Bakk’s campaign emails to say “Sen. Bakk will abide by the endorsement.  The door is not open.”

Margaret Anderson Kelliher: This was not the same MAK I’ve seen in dozens of Capital press conferences.  She was very strong, sharp and showed some passion.  (that’s not to say she isn’t good in the pressers, she just usually doesn’t show a lot of passion).  She had a great answer when asked about the deficit.  A very nice performance.  Will abide.

The Bottom Line

Top performers:  Kelliher, Thissen, Entenza, Dayton, Rybak

In the middle: Rukavina, Gaertner

Not very good:  Bakk, Marty, Kelley

October 10, 2009, 2:34 pm | Category: MN 2010: Governor | Tags: , , , , , , , , , .

My Thoughts On Coleman’s Departure

by Zack Stephenson | 17 Comments

Just some observations:

  1. So far, this race has been less about who is running and more about who isn’t.  Imagine how different this field would look if any of the following candidates had decided to run: Chris Coleman, Tim Walz, Jim Ramstad, Norm Coleman, and Tim Pawlenty.  A lot is being written about who many candidates there are in this race, but to me it is more interesting how long the list is of stong candidates who have passed on this race.  I mean, Marty Siefert and Tom Emmer are probably the two strongest GOP candidates right now.  That will never stop striking me as absolutley absurd.
  2. Some people will argue that Coleman’s departure helps Matt Entenza, but those people are wrong.  The thing about Entenza is that he tends to be a pretty polarizing guy.  There are a lot of people who hate him, and there are some people that love him.  If Entenza is going to win, he needs the people who hate him to be splintered between multiple candidates.  If everyone in the DFL who hates Matt Entenza ends up backing one or even two candidates, he’s not going to win.  Entenza has a chance only if he’s playing in a field with many candidates and no strong frontrunner.
  3. The truth is, Coleman’s decision not to run benefits R.T. Rybak, Margaret Anderson Kelliher (to a lesser extent) and no one else.  Yesterday, the DFL field boiled down to three frontrunners: Coleman, Rybak and Margaret Anderson Kelliher.  Now we’re down to Rybak and Kelliher.  How does that change things?  First things first, the longshots just became longershots.  A less fractured field will make it tougher for someone like Paul Thissen or Tom Bakk to make a splash.  I also think that a lot of Coleman’s support was from establishment DFLers and urban liberals.  Both of those constiuencies are likely to move to Kelliher or Rybak now (particularly the establishment support—they are not going to move to Susan Gaertner, for instance).
  4. There is a lot of political talent on the market right now.  Chris Coleman had a great campaign team assembled (in my opinion, the best among the 2010 contenders) and I’m really curious where those people will go now.  I actually think a surprisingly large number will stay with Coleman.  The Mayor has a reputation as a great boss and this profession is full of terrible bosses.  That being said, some people will move on, which creates a big opportunity for the other candidates.
October 9, 2009, 10:57 am | Category: MN 2010: Governor |

Coleman Out

by Sean Broom | 7 Comments

St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman can be removed from all those lists of potential DFL candidates for Governor, because he just announced he isn’t running.

I think the obvious benefactor of this is RT who has already had a pretty clutch month with the Teamsters endorsement and who now has one less viable competitor for the DFL endorsement.  I think the other winner out of this is Matt Entenza who has been competing with Coleman for union endorsements**, and in fact I’m curious if a major public employees union telegraphed to Coleman that he wasn’t going to get their endorsement and was this announcement because he didn’t think he had the math to win without that major endorsement?

The race is starting to shake out and I figure it’ll get a whole lot clearer in the near future with the earlier DFL convention date.  It’s time to separate the chaff from the wheat.

(** I just wanted to point out that obviously all the candidates are competing for union endorsements, but particularly in Coleman’s case I think it was more important for him to have union support because he had no real obvious constituency otherwise, or at least he had no unique constituency.  As well, Entenza has been actively courting union and institutional endorsements and I would be very very curious to see what happens with AFSCME’s endorsement now.)

Update: in a release written to disguise his joy, Matt Entenza comments on the loss of Coleman from the field he never actually entered.

Further updates: someone in a position to know said it wasn’t AFSCME.  But that’s why we speculate wildly about local politics, so you don’t have to.

October 8, 2009, 3:40 pm | Category: MN 2010: Governor |

Pat Anderson: Seifert’s “Leadership Plan” is unconstitutional

by Jeff Rosenberg | 10 Comments

Let the infighting begin!

Yesterday, I wrote about GOP gubernatorial candidate Marty Seifert’s radical proposals, which he tried to hide behind several layers of buzzwords. What I didn’t expect, though, was that even fellow conservatives think he’s gone too far.

Fellow candidate Pat Anderson thinks his proposal to strip welfare benefits from those he deems not to have been Minnesota residents for long enough is unconstitutional. I would agree with that. Of course, Anderson can’t allow Seifert to appear more conservative than she is, so she simultaneously calls Seifert too liberal on a completely different issue.

Anderson hasn’t posted the full press release to her website, but here’s a portion (via Mary Lahammer):

Gubernatorial Candidate Pat Anderson disputes
Rep. Marty Seifert’s “Leadership Plan”

Seifert incorrectly states education vouchers are unconstitutional
while proposing unconstitutional welfare reform

More »

September 25, 2009, 5:57 am | Category: MN 2010: Governor | Tags: , .