Hot dish 093024

By Josie Albertson-Grove

Good morning and welcome to another Monday. Suburban voters in swing districts are going to be a key constituency in the presidential election and in the race for the Minnesota statehouse, and I’d guess Gov. Tim Walz and Sen. JD Vance might try to address them during their debate tomorrow.

As we’ve been talking about the ‘burbs, I got curious to hear what suburban and exurban legislative candidates have been hearing and how they’re going to tailor their messages to address those voters’ worries.

Turns out, voters are talking not about the nationally-animating issues of abortion and immigration, candidates said, but they are worried about the cost of living, pollution, education and crime. Abortion and immigration were much more on voters’ minds two years ago, one DFL candidate told me.

Abortion remains a key issue for the Harris campaign, with a pre-debate news conference scheduled today in St. Paul, and a reproductive freedom-focused bus tour with stops today in Duluth with Sen. Tina Smith and Wayzata with First Lady Gwen Walz.

Reporting the suburban voter story involved leaving a couple dozen voicemails and emails over the last few weeks to each Republican and Democrat in the suburban and exurban districts we are watching this year and talking to several of those candidates on both sides of the aisle.

I say that not to pat myself on the back, but to tell you the whole exercise ended up being pretty faith-restoring! People across the political spectrum — and there are some very conservative Republicans running for suburban seats and some very liberal Democrats — are hearing about the same issues from voters, and seem to be cognizant of the same problems. Even if they disagree on solutions, we’re starting with a common recognition of what the problems are and a shared reality that seems essential to compromise.

Is that optimism you hear? In the year 2024? Maybe! Ask me how I feel after the VP debate.

THIRD PARTY: After a Brainerd-area police chief signed a petition supporting a third-party candidate for House, the chief says he got pressure from the Republican incumbent to recant his support.

Kim Hyatt has a phenomenal small-town politics yarn that is really worth reading in full. Here’s the gist:

Pequot Lakes Police Chief Mike Davis said that Rep. Josh Heintzeman, R-Nisswa, pressured him for support after Davis signed a petition to get a conservative third-party candidate on the ballot, making Heitzeman’s reelection to the 6B seat a three-way race against DFLer Emily LeClaire and the independent conservative candidate Troy Scheffler.

Scheffler has accused Heintzeman of violating the Fair Campaign Practices Act during the interaction with Davis in a complaint.

During the call, the complaint alleges, Heintzeman first tried to get Davis to claim his signature was a joke. He then “began to try shaming Davis into withdrawing support for (Scheffler),” urging Davis to support him instead and suggesting support for Scheffler “would risk the Democrat being elected.”

Scheffler said he’d be OK with that result since he cares more about getting Heintzeman out of office: “The Republican Party would be far better off with him losing this round and having a Democrat in for two years.” Davis, for his part, just wanted voters to have more options, he told Hyatt.

FOOTBALL: Walz spent Saturday at the Minnesota-Michigan football game, with the campaign taking another opportunity to revel in the “Coach Walz” thing. The Associated Press’ Joey Cappelletti reported Walz was greeted at the airport by University of Michigan students, who had arrived in a bus bearing a “Put Me In, Coach!” banner.

The Harris campaign pushed out video of Walz hugging Goldy Gopher and glad-handing with Minnesota coach P.J. Fleck even as Walz ignored or didn’t hear questions shouted from reporters about his debate prep, according to a press pool.

The Harris campaign also rolled out a list of endorsements from athletes over the weekend, with co-chairs including tennis icon Billie Jean King, a very California-heavy roster of basketball greats such as Candace Parker, Magic Johnson and Steve Kerr, and some football players your football-ambivalent correspondent has never heard of.

The strategy is to reach young men, per a campaign press release, so I guess I’m not the target demographic.

PACKAGE: Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon’s office was one of several elections offices that has received mysterious packages with the return address of “United States Traitor Elimination Army.”

Rochelle Olson wrote Simon has been raising the alarm about intimidation and violence ahead of the election.

In his capacity as the president of the National Association of Secretaries of State, Simon sent a letter on Sept. 17 raising awareness of threats to election officials. He sent the letter after officials elsewhere received the threatening packages.

The letter described the continuation of a “disturbing trend,” including a “second assassination attempt of a presidential candidate, and threatening and intimidating actions towards election officials.”

Simon’s own office was evacuated Friday and the State Patrol, FBI and U.S. Postal Inspection Service were investigating, Simon’s spokeswoman, Cassondra Knudson, said.

“Not fun, but we’ll get past this,” Simon texted Olson about the threatening package his office received.

WHERE’S WALZ:

Nothing on the public or campaign schedules today as Gov. Tim Walz preps for tomorrow night’s debate after he spent some time last week shadowboxing Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg in the role of Vance.

READING LIST

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