Minnesota’s U.S. Senate candidates are oddly quiet as campaign turns toward final stretch
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It’s 43 days to the election, do you know where your U.S. Senate candidates are?
The race for Minnesota’s open Senate seat is oddly quiet with a little more than six weeks to go.
It’s a contrast to the blistering pace of rallies and parades, publicized campaign stops and barrage of ads seen before the August primary set up the race between Democratic nominee Peggy Flanagan and Republican nominee Michele Tafoya.
Beyond the days both spent at the Minnesota State Fair, the campaigns have had a low-key, almost underground feel.
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Press conferences have been virtually nonexistent, as is the case with policy rollouts. Debates are seen as iffy even as both campaigns profess to want them. Events where the candidates do appear are not advertised in advance and mainly show up as social media clips later.
Flanagan, the sitting lieutenant governor, appeared at some union-organized Labor Day events and other community gatherings. Tafoya, a former sports broadcaster making her initial run for office, has popped up in greater Minnesota and in interviews with conservative outlets.
Even as both camps have started to air TV ads, it’s nowhere near the amount seen in the governor’s race. Outside groups haven’t really stepped in either.
“I always sort of say in politics is define or be defined, and what I find interesting is that the Republicans aren't yet aren't defining Flanagan, and Tafoya is not defining herself,” said Hamline University political science professor David Schultz.
MPR News contacted both campaigns and reviewed social media updates from the candidates to see what they’ve been up to lately.
Go now, post later
For each, it’s been a mix of metro-area and greater Minnesota events. Flanagan has attended several events with organized labor in Duluth, open streets in Minneapolis, a Mexican independence day celebration in Minneapolis, among other appearances.
Tafoya visited businesses in northern Minnesota, including a safety glass company in Pine River, a parade in Jordan and the opening of a Minnesota military museum at Camp Ripley.
Schultz said both campaigns appear to have a lot of money at their disposal.
“You would be thinking at this point that right on the edge of early voting, or going into the early voting period, is when I would start to see all that money being unloaded,” he said.
Both campaigns purchased commercial time for the coming weeks, targeting morning and evening news shows along with widely viewed college and professional football games.
Fraud is a focus
In those ads and social media posts, Tafoya has focused on social services fraud that occurred during Gov. Tim Walz’s tenure when Flanagan was his second-in-command.
“Peggy Flanagan ignored warning signs while fraudsters stole our tax dollars,” Tafoya writes in one post on X. “She has spent eight years as lieutenant governor in the Walz administration, yet now wants Minnesotans to believe she had nothing to do with its failures.”
For Flanagan, the fraud issue has been an albatross. Tafoya and other opponents said she can’t easily escape the millions of dollars in fraud and should have done more to stop it.
Flanagan has responded by saying she’s “appalled by the fraud,” adding she was not the point person on the issue.
“The governor has taken the lead here. And the administration has been aggressive internally in working to stop fraud, prevent it from happening in the first place,” Flanagan said in a primary debate on MPR in July. “And I think the measures that have been passed through the legislature, in particular, this office, this independent Office of Inspector General, I think, is powerful.”
Debates coming?
Flanagan’s campaign has agreed to two debates so far, including one MPR News would host and another hosted by KBJR in Duluth. Tafoya’s campaign has not confirmed if she’ll participate in either or others she’s contemplating.
Schultz said that might be by design.
“I think she’s benefiting right now from being an unknown quantity politically,” he said. “Obviously people know her from her sports announcing and so forth like that.”
Flanagan’s campaign has also been active on social media, opening attacks on Tafoya by tying her to President Donald Trump and the winter immigration enforcement surge.
When a political candidate doesn’t have a political record, it can be tougher on their opponents to sift through their record.
But like former U.S. Sen. Al Franken, Tafoya came into politics after previously hosting local radio and podcast programs where she’s interviewed guests and staked out positions.
When concerns over Franken’s past writing and comedy bits were brought up in his 2008 run, Franken first said it was his job as a comedian. But he later apologized for jokes that were offensive.
Podcast scrutinized
Tafoya's long-running podcast has begun to get some scrutiny.
Last week, Punchbowl News highlighted several episodes in which Tafoya showcased guests who participated in the Jan, 6, 2021 Capitol riot and faced charges for their actions.
Tafoya defended them and argued that the U.S. Justice Department under President Joe Biden was used politically.
In one interview reviewed by MPR News, Tafoya interviewed actor Jay Johnston, who was convicted of charges that included handing a stolen U.S. Capitol police shield to other rioters. He was sentenced to a year and a day in prison, but was pardoned by Trump on his first day back in the White House. On her podcast, Johnston said he was caught up in the moment but did nothing wrong.
“I am so sorry you went through this,” Tafoya said. “It’s so agonizing to hear these stories from people who really did nothing wrong and for political reasons, in the United freaking States of America, went through what you went through is sort of impossible to believe.”
She hosted other Jan. 6 participants, saying it appears they were unfairly prosecuted and punished.
Flanagan’s team has also linked to episodes of Tafoya’s podcast.
In one post, Flanagan writes, “When someone shows you who they are, believe them,” linking to a video of Tafoya’s podcast in which she says many “good people” were “caught up in the shuffle” and arrested during the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol.
Tafoya’s campaign didn’t respond to an MPR News inquiry but issued a statement on behalf of the candidate to Punchbowl News: “I’m a journalist who’s recorded hundreds of interviews. It’s easy to take things out of context.”
Tafoya didn’t specify what was taken out of context, but she added: “All violent criminals must be prosecuted — from the criminals who assaulted cops on January 6th to the rioters, looters and carjackers here in Minnesota who got off easy under Peggy Flanagan,” the statement said.
So far, Minnesota’s race hasn’t risen on the national radar in the same way as competitive contests in Maine, Michigan, North Carolina, Georgia, Ohio, Texas and other states.
“What we're seeing is that when the Republicans are assessing the seats that they need to hold and the ones that they have the best shot at picking up,” Schultz said. “Minnesota might still come down a little bit further on the list.”
Without a GOP infusion, national Democratic groups don’t appear to be investing either.
Flanagan navigated an expensive and bruising primary to win the nomination over Democratic U.S. Rep. Angie Craig. Right away, Craig threw her support behind Flanagan and the two clasped hands at a party unity event.
Tafoya, who is regarded as a more-moderate GOP candidate than past nominees, did not get the immediate backing of her main primary opponent, Adam Schwarze. He had the party’s convention endorsement but couldn’t convert that into the nomination.
Schwarze, who had the backing of hardline Republicans, said that since the primary he reached out to Tafoya’s campaign five times to see how he can help. He said Friday that he has not heard back.
“I’m just trying to be a team player and help,” he said. “I’m just disappointed that there wasn’t an opportunity to mend the fences and show a unified front.”
