DFL, GOP angle for 2020 election edge after Legislature's session

Maneuvering for political advantage from the Minnesota Legislature's session began even before the final whack of the gavel on May 25.

Both parties are recruiting candidates, devising campaign themes and targeting districts for Nov. 3, 2020, when every seat in both chambers will be on the ballot. But the consequences could stretch far beyond the next election.

The GOP has a 35-32 margin in the Senate. The DFL reclaimed power in the House last year and has 75 members to Republicans' 59. If the GOP wins back the House and retains the Senate, it could block DFL Gov. Tim Walz's agenda and steer redistricting after next year's census. If Democrats take over, the governor's priorities could advance largely unimpeded.

Both sides believe the overtime session gave them a strong case to make to voters.

Republicans can boast about thwarting Walz's proposed 20-cent-per-gallon gas tax increase, said House Minority Leader Kurt Daudt, R-Crown. They also can argue that the governor is not the moderate he campaigned as, is out of touch with most Minnesotans and "needs a check and balance in the Legislature," he said.

The DFL counterpoint: The Senate's "wall of resistance" is responsible for inaction on some health care issues, paid family and medical leave and climate measures, said House Majority Leader Ryan Winkler of Golden Valley. "This legislative session was fighting tooth and nail just to hold on to what we have," he said.

Neither party is waiting for the Legislature to reconvene on Feb. 11 before mapping out election strategies.

A House Republican steering committee is "doing plenty of outreach" to line up strong 2020 candidates, said GOP strategist Gregg Peppin. Looking ahead to next fall, he said, some members of his party "are cautiously optimistic and some … are cautiously wary."

DFL operative Jeff Blodgett said discussions are getting underway about targeting Senate districts now represented by Republicans. "If you look at where [House] districts changed hands in 2018, that's a pretty good road map to where the opportunities are," he said.

Winning even a few of those Senate seats would create opportunities to advance DFL priorities such as paid leave, a public health care option and the gas tax to fund infrastructure improvements, said Minnesota AFL-CIO President Bill McCarthy. The suburbs are "where we target races where we think we can flip and gain a majority."

Bryan Strawser, chairman of the Minnesota Gun Owners Political Action Committee, believes that "the fight between gun control and gun rights will be on the agenda in 2020, particularly in the suburbs," where he also plans to target specific races. Tighter restrictions on firearms were defeated in this year's session.

In the 2018 midterm elections, suburban voters helped set turnout records and fueled Democrats' takeover of the U.S. House and the lower chamber in Minnesota.

Daudt thinks his party has a shot at flipping the nine seats it needs to reclaim control of the House. President Donald Trump carried 13 state House districts now held by Democrats, he said, and "there are a lot of seats that Trump didn't win that we lost very narrowly in the suburbs" last year.

Winkler foresees a broader battleground that includes suburbs, regional population centers and rural areas, which strongly backed the president in 2016. "It will be interesting to see if rural areas come out for Trump like 2016 or if they're turned off," he said.

It's hard to predict the ramifications of Trump's spot at the top of next year's ballot, partisans from both sides said.

His impact "goes up and down depending on the day," said Republican political strategist Amy Koch. "That was the reality of 2018, and it's going to be the reality of 2020."

She credits Democrats' success at mobilizing voters for their 2018 victories and added that the GOP "did not turn out at presidential levels." Next year they will, she said.

Some Minnesota voters opted for Democratic legislative candidates last year because it was their only way "to send a message to the president," Daudt said. "This time around the president is going to be on the ballot," so they won't have to telegraph displeasure through other races.

Winkler, on the other hand, predicts that 2020 "will all be the Trump show," which could make it harder for other candidates to focus on issues or break through the political din.

But issues always matter, said Kenza Hadj-Moussa, spokeswoman for the progressive group TakeAction Minnesota. She hopes voters noticed that the DFL House was "extremely responsive to the needs in people's lives," including the cost of insulin, paid leave and driver's licenses for immigrants.

She also sees an emerging concern that could mobilize voters here and across the nation: new state efforts to ban abortions that have "really awakened a lot of people."

Education Minnesota President Denise Specht puts schools on that list, too. The Legislature approved a 2% annual per-pupil increase in state school aid, but she believes divided government precluded more progress.

The teachers union will make that case next year, Specht said, and will build on its success heading into last year's elections, when it organized a substantial increase in the number of members who voted.

The conservative group Americans for Prosperity-Minnesota was dismayed by Democrats' efforts to increase spending and taxes, said director Jason Flohrs. His group plans door-to-door, mail and phone campaigns focused on electing legislators who agree.

He's unsure how Trump will affect 2020 campaigns. The group opposes the president's "ineffective trade war with China" that it says hurts Minnesota farmers. "But counterbalance that with a metro economy that's booming and the [federal] tax reform that did work," Flohrs said.

Absent from legislative leaders' and activists' lists of priorities and worries for 2020 was the topic that is roiling Congress and the Democratic presidential race: the prospect of impeaching the president.

"I have not seen any skittishness" about it among Minnesota Republicans, whose view is "let 'em do it," Peppin said.

Judy Keen • 612-673-4234