Dayton, Johnson duel over middle-class mantle in Duluth debate

DFL Gov. Mark Dayton and his GOP challenger Jeff Johnson painted sharply contrasting portraits of where Minnesota is and where it should be headed during a debate Tuesday in Duluth.

While Dayton said the state is on the right track, Johnson argued Minnesota is losing ground to other states and said the way of life in northern Minnesota is under attack.

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Minnesota has an unfriendly tax and regulatory climate that's driving entrepreneurs to other states, Johnson said, adding that he'd focus on creating "maximum wage jobs" but would not roll back the minimum wage increase passed during Dayton's first term last year.

Dayton told the audience Minnesota was financially sound now compared to 2011 when he took office and the state faced high unemployment, a $6 billion budget deficit, and a huge loan it needed to repay to public schools. Dayton and the Legislature responded, in part, with a tax on the wealthiest 2 percent of Minnesotans to increase funding for K-12 and early childhood education.

"There are 162,000 more jobs in Minnesota today than there were when I took office," he said. "We balanced the budget, we're looking at budget surpluses ahead, we paid off the entire $2.8 billion we owed our public schools."

Overall, he argued, Minnesota is faring better than most other states.

"Governor," Johnson countered, "I would disagree with you that everything is rosy, and as I travel around the state, people don't feel that way. They have real concerns about their jobs. We're not creating businesses."

While Johnson continually criticized the results of Dayton's first term, the governor pressed him for specifics on what he would do to change things. On transportation, Dayton asked how Johnson would pay to fix roads and bridges.

"Don't just say reorder priorities; tell us where you're going to come up with $6 billion, or even half of that," Dayton said. "Tell us where that money is? So we can know we have some step toward a solution of a problem, and not just a campaign speech that claims we can get something for nothing."

Johnson said he'd been talking about where to find money and advocated selling bonds to raise money for transportation.

He said he would not raise the gas tax to pay for infrastructure. Dayton agreed, but later said he would consider a wholesale tax on gasoline that could raise more money than a tax at the pump.

The debate then shifted to two divisive environmental issues in northeast Minnesota.

Johnson accused Dayton of "hiding behind the process" that he says has slowed down approval of the Sandpiper pipeline that would bring oil from North Dakota across Minnesota, and the PolyMet copper-nickel mine near Hoyt Lakes currently under environmental review.

"Let's just be really frank and honest about this. This governor is beholden to what I would call some pretty extreme environmental groups, mostly based down in the Twin Cities, who don't want to see any mining in this state."

Dayton responded that the Hennepin County Commissioner is pandering for votes in northern Minnesota, a claim the governor made in the last debate.

"Commissioner, it is pandering to say you're going to preempt the environmental review process. I agree nine years has been too long, but that's not a reason or justification for short circuiting the final months of the process. Which is what they're going through now."

Absent from the back and forth was Independence Party candidate Hannah Nicollet. The Duluth Chamber of Commerce, which sponsored the debate, told her it wanted to honor an agreement made with Dayton and Johnson to keep the debate to two candidates.

Nicollet called that unfair because Minnesota voters have given the Independence Party major party status.

"We're a legitimate third option. We're socially tolerant, and fiscally responsible. So we're half of the other two parties," she said. "We don't believe in legislating morality, but we also believe in doing a cost benefit analysis, not spending money that we don't have."

Nicollet says she's still in negotiations with the organizers of the final two debates, scheduled for Oct. 19 and Oct. 31 in the Twin Cities.