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Capitol View®
Catharine Richert

Race for control of state House attracts big money

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Between them, the Minnesota House DFL and Republican caucuses have more than $2 million to spend on their fight over control of the House, according to fundraising reports released today.

The House DFL Caucus has about $1.5 million to protect its 73 seat majority.

Meanwhile, the Republican Caucus has $633,000 to spend battling for seven seats - the minimum it needs to wrest the chamber from Democrats.

A closer look at the most recent campaign finance reports released today shows there's also a great deal of financial interest in just a few House races from the political parties and their allied groups that are technically independent of the campaigns.

All told, at least $688,000 has been spent on media -things like ads, mailers, phone banking and web communications- to position Democrats and Republicans for a victory in the House this fall.

While that’s far less than the $2.5 million the parties and their allies have shoveled into ads and mailers in the race between Gov. Mark Dayton and his Republican rival Jeff Johnson, more outside groups are investing in media for the House races than are in the gubernatorial race.

The money is focused on just a handful of races where Democrats have a tenuous hold on their seats, particularly in districts that former presidential candidate Mitt Romney won in 2012, but that are controlled by DFL legislators.

Republicans see a big opportunity in November, said Ben Golnik, who chairs a conservative group called the Minnesota Jobs Coalition.

“One party rule has been very tough on Republicans,” Golnik said. “Whereas the governor’s race was a little unclear because of the [late summer] primary, the House has been set since a day after the election two years ago.”

Golnik’s group has already spent $41,000 helping a handful of Republicans win their primaries earlier this year, and plans to spend more this fall.

Districts that are seeing some of the biggest outside spending so far include House District 56B, which is held by Rep. Will Morgan, DFL-Burnsville and House District 48A, which is held by Rep. Yvonne Selcer, DFL-Minnetonka.

Both won their districts by a narrow margin in 2012. So far, state parties, caucuses and outside groups have spent roughly $39,000 and $45,000 on mailers and other media respectively either supporting Morgan and Selcer or opposing their challengers.

Minnesota Republicans may also see last minute help from the Republican State Leadership Committee, a Washington, D.C.-based group that helps elect GOP state legislators around the country and pumped more than $600,000 into Minnesota races in 2012.

Earlier this year, the RSLC put the Minnesota House on its list of 16 targeted chambers, but so far the money has yet to materialize.

“Traditionally, the flurry of activity for state house races is in the final stretch ,the last 30 days or so. And you can expect that to be the case in Minnesota," said RSLC spokeswoman Jill Bader.

In conjunction with the state Republican Party, the House Republican Caucus has also made a big investment in House races. All told, the party and the caucus have spent $134,000 on House races.

One driver of that spending was a hotly contested primary race between GOP incumbent Jenifer Loon and her Republican opponent Sheila Kihne in District 48B in Eden Prairie. House Republicans spent $30,000 against Kihne to help Loon keep her seat.

While it may appear the state Republican party is putting a lot of money into media for House races rather than the gubernatorial race, party chairman Keith Downey said the party is supporting Johnson and all the candidates through a revamped ground game that includes 18 election offices scattered across the state, door-knocking and other get-out-the-vote efforts.

“The state party made a very strong commitment… around our ground game and rebuilding our capabilities through our victory centers, phoning,” Downey said. “The best way for the state party to help in this election cycle was to be sure we’re not in the same position we were in two years ago.”

Downey wouldn’t say whether the party will put money into buying ads for Johnson before Election Day.

Six weeks from the election, the GOP has $260,000 in its war chest.

UPDATE: A more exhaustive look at the latest reports show that independent spending on Minnesota House races is actually much higher - about $750,000 has been invested in the most competitive races so far.